


The Morning Star

by Evie_Rai



Category: Original Work
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Angels & Demons, Alternate Universe - Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Priests, Angel & Demon Interactions, Angel/Human Relationships, Angst and Romance, Angst and Tragedy, Brotherly Angst, Brothers, Churches & Cathedrals, Conflict, Conflict of Interests, Debauchery, Demon Deals, Demon Sex, Demon/Human Relationships, Demonic Possession, Demons, Developing Relationship, Drama & Romance, Dream Demon, Dream Sex, Dubious Ethics, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Emotional Infidelity, Emotional Manipulation, End of Days, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Established Relationship, F/M, Fallen Angel Lucifer, Fallen Angels, Falling In Love, Fluff and Angst, Fluff and Smut, Forbidden Love, Four Horsemen, Hate to Love, Heaven & Hell, Human Sacrifice, Ideology, Infidelity, Jealousy, Killing, Love Confessions, Lust, Major Original Character(s), Mentions of Myth & Folklore, Moral Lessons, Morality, Morally Ambiguous Character, Near Death Experiences, Niflheim, Oral Sex, Original Character-centric, Original Fiction, POV Original Female Character, Possessive Behavior, Pregnancy, Pregnant Sex, Protectiveness, Purgatory, Purgatory Sex, Religious Conflict, Religious Imagery & Symbolism, Secrets, Sex, Unplanned Pregnancy, Unrequited Lust
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-08
Updated: 2021-03-03
Packaged: 2021-03-06 22:00:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 20
Words: 33,580
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26356111
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Evie_Rai/pseuds/Evie_Rai
Summary: "The Herald will come and with it the one who will decide the fate of this most ancient war."Told that her soon to be child is the Herald for the End of Days, that the child’s father is Lucifer himself, she thinks that is her only problem.Until she is told that she will have seven days after giving birth to decide the fate of mankind or let it all burn into ruin.
Relationships: Original Female Character & Original Male Character
Comments: 58
Kudos: 27





	1. Feather Falls

**Author's Note:**

> A huge thank you to, Dianasaurus for helping me fine out the plot for this! ❤️❤️❤️
> 
> You’re a star!  
> 😘😘

* * *

* * *

Impi

Finnish: Maiden, Virgin

Pronounced: EEM-pee

* * *

* * *

The night was permanent in the underworld.  
  
Skies never-ending and stretching into a horizon that would never see the light of the sun, the world below was darkness. Even the castle that sat on a coastline of black sands and water mixed with oil was built in black stones. Spiralling towers and spires vanishing into the clouds the arch windows gloomily lit by green flames from candlelight and torches.  
  
  
Gardens created with bare hedges and rose thorns, there was a winter like beauty within its darkness. No life sustained by the dry and cracked soil that even the grass grew in pastel shades of black and grey. The gardens were not without their decorative charms, however. Some gargoyles stood guard at the foot of the sweeping staircases and gates, that sat in alcoves and at every turning twist of the barren mazes made of twisted rose thorns. Among them were the statues Impi uncovered or stumbled across that always wore twisted faces of terror, pain, and the most incredible agony.  
  
Many times Impi wondered if they were once real people. Entombed for eternity by marble or stone as a record of their final horrendous moment in life. Scared and left to be forgotten as something observed so frequently that no one honestly noticed them.  
  
Hell was not how Impi imagined. There was darkness in every corner that it could reach and there was a beauty too. Beings and things of such otherworldly imagination that Impi still struggled to fathom them.  
  
Peacocks of ruby reds and blacks shivered their magnificent feathers in the gardens, seeking a mate with the grandiose displays of their plumage. Dogs roamed in shadowy masses. Owls with eyes like onyx stone stared from the bare branches that were never touched by a leaf. The oceans held beasts that churned the waters but never broke the surface.  
  
Hell was a magnificent night and full of endless splendour as it was brimming with wickedness. A place that held no directions. Where left became right and up could become down if a person tried to travel it unawares or not knowing where they wanted to be.  
  
Every thought manipulated the surroundings. That it could twist from the deepest winter night to a cavernous pit of lava if a person let their imagination roam freely. Impi learned that the hard way. That thought could change the environment. Turn something innocent into certain death.  
  
Impi lost count the number of times the ground beneath vanished, and she was left falling into an abyss until she gathered her breath and her thoughts and found a solid foundation again.  
  
Learning to survive Hell was a continued lesson that never saw an end. It would never see an end the whole time Impi was carrying the unborn child of the Morning Star himself.  
  
Lucifer. Satan. The Devil.  
  
He went by many names, images, beliefs and ideas. Evil personified. A trickster. A liar. A thief. Oh, the things he was were endless. To Impi, he was every little thing he was known for and more.  
  
For when Impi met Lucifer, he was a mortal man. A simple, handsome, charming and intellectual man with a silver tongue and a gentle grin that always seemed to hold a secret.  
  
An almighty secret was held behind those tainted lips and silk-like tongue that wooed Impi - now that she thought about it - with far too much ease. He knew what she wanted to hear, what she wanted out of a man and a relationship, and he gave her it all tied up in a neat little ribbon within him.  
  
The Devil was literally in the details when he turned up in Impi's life with all too right timing. Giving up on the idea that she would find a decent man it came to a heart shuddering end with the chance - planned - meeting that was so horrendously cliche that she groaned when thinking about it.  
  
Now, there she was. Living in the underworld waiting for the birth of Lucifer's firstborn. The supposed herald of the end of days. Impi always believed that being able to be a mother was a precious gift. A blessing. What most - not all - women dreamed of one day being.  
  
Not every woman though was told the night after numerous fornications that their partner was the Devil and he successfully sowed his seed.  
  
Impi at first believed he was drunk or high or was suffering some mental ailment when he announced the news as casually as someone offered a guest a drink that she was pregnant and he was the Morning Star.  
  
Laughing almost uncontrollably over it, Impi swallowed her laughter and her breath, and everything she only ever thought was man-made nonsense when he stood at the foot of the bed and from his back stretched out a magnificent set of wings.  
  
Darker than ebony and somehow shimmering like the starriest of skies, the silk under touch feathers bristled against the edges of the room. It was too small to allow him to spread them entirely, but he scattered them complete with a smile on his lips that only the Devil himself could smile.  
  
Tricked, deceived, made a considerable fool by the king of them all, Impi couldn't bring herself to be angry at the man who literally was true to his nature in gaining all that he needed.  
  
A woman who could carry his child and who's birth would be the catalyst for an ancient war finally being drawn to an end.  
  
A war that would end all wars and finally decide the victor between Heaven and Hell.  
  
Impi was carrying the deadliest child to the world as anyone knew it, and there was nothing she could do to stop it. A part of Impi didn't even want to. To give up this chance of motherhood even with knowing what its birth would start and what she would become post-birth.  
  
Looking again upon the blackened moon that was so close it felt like it could be touched, Impi recalled with complete clarity what she was told only seconds after he revealed his identity.  
  
"Our child shall be the herald, but you will decide who wins."  
  
If it was not a significant burden enough to be carrying the child of Lucifer which would be the herald of the end of days, then Impi didn't know what to think when she was told that in the first sunrise after the birth she would have precisely seven days to decide who she would side with.  
  
For Impi was no simple and ordinary woman but the ultimate weapon of the ancient battle for dominion.  
  
Able to foresee the outcome of any planned attack of the side Impi picked before they made it, she would be the one to guide them to victory by knowing already the chances of their success. A prestigious - daunting - role in holding to decide the fate of the heavens, earth and Hell. To be the one to ultimately decide who would win and who would lose for good.  
  
A choice that would need to be made within seven days after the birth of her child, but that she had a whole year to make a final decision on who she would ally with.  
  
The Angels, The Fallen, or Lucifer himself.  
  
It was why Impi was outside the castle, meandering through the night and the desolate gardens after the most recent visit from the Demonic midwives who poked and prodded with their sharp nails at her still flattened stomach. Checking on the progress of the impending firstborn child of Lucifer with great joy and celebration.  
  
Impi was a little excited over the prospect of being a mother, but there were still fears aplenty that could not be settled. Not when she was told that there would be attempts by the angels and the fallen to sway Impi to their side. Akin to how Lucifer too had to convince Impi to align with him.  
  
There was only truly one relief in the whole thing, and it was that Impi could not be forcibly coerced or forced at all to join any of the three factions vying for her alliance. The choice had to be made by her own volition. They could persuade Impi but nothing that overstepped into the realms of manipulation.  
  
Which left Lucifer with both an advantage and the most significant disadvantage.  
  
Impi might have grown to love the man she met, and she still did - begrudgingly. However, love could not change what he was or what he wanted to do should he win.  
  
Knowing that Impi would decide the fate of all mankind was not a decision that could be made lightly or for the sake of being in love with the very being who would see all that man built sent into ruin.  
  
It was why when a single large black feather flitted before Impi's eyes that a breath escaped her pursed lips and she plucked it from the never-ending darkness, twirling the soft star kissed feather between her fingers.  
  
It was his calling card almost. A warning that he was close by and about to appear like he always seemed to do. From nowhere.  
  
Impi gazed upon the feather for only a second before she found her eyes missing the light of the dark moon. Shrouded further by the darkness and with it came the beating of the air when the magnificent spread of his wings settled from their flight, curling back in to tuck tightly against his back.  
  
Impi lowered the feather and looked up at the man who was dressed head to toe in a fine black suit, his smile as cold and astute as his eyes that were rippling back to the ones she had, a long time ago, fallen in love with.  
  
God - the irony - how she hated how much she loved the man who towered over her. It was why she bypassed her usual, more excited greeting for him and chose instead to simply mutter: _"Fuck you, Abbot."_  
  
Brow lifting but still smiling, Abbot - as he called himself when they met - held his chin in one hand and cocked his head. Studying Impi beneath his cold astute gaze, the smile became less amused the longer Impi remained in a scowl.  
  
_"Human women are so fickle."_ Abbot sighed with a shake of the head when his eyes became half-lidded. _"You're usually much happier to see me."_ He took the hand from his chin. _"So why...,"_ trialling off when Impi denied his efforts to soften her up, Abbot curled back his fingers, letting them remain suspended. _"The change?"_ He finally asked.  
  
There was nothing particular that left Impi in a prickly mood with Abbot. Only in a mood because she could be, Impi discovered that carrying the child of Satan was also absolutely chaotic on her hormones. Angered by the tiniest things, Impi came to the conclusion that it was Abbot's fault. Everything was Abbot's fault.  
  
It almost was an entirely true statement which made it seem less like Impi was unreasonable and foul-tempered without cause.  
  
_"I have been poked and prodded for the last...!"_ Impi stopped only due to realising she held no concept of time in Hell.  
  
Did it exist like it did in the mortal world?  
  
Head shaking Impi flicked the single feather back at Abbot. _"I want to go home!"_ She demanded. Again. For what felt like the millionth time.  
  
Abbot remained quiet and passive up until the second Impi flicked away the feather he gifted her, a pinch of irritation creasing his brow before he plucked it out the air.  
  
Like Impi was doing a second before, Abbot twirled the feather between his fingers the thin line of his mouth cracking at the edges when he articulated for the millionth time why Impi was safer in Hell.  
  
_"I hate repeating myself. Even once."_ Abbot shook his head like he was about to reprimand Impi harshly, _"Albeit I make great exceptions for you, my patience is a fragile thing. Stop pushing it."_ Abbot spoke softly, but there was no mistaking the warning within it.  
  
Wanting to become pouty and even more horrendously moody, Impi reconsidered when Abbot again tried to gift her the feather he dropped before he arrived. Each time it was intended as a gift, and Abbot told Impi more than once that he could not lose too many so to take care of them when he gave them to her.  
  
Impi took the feather, stroking the silk-like edges, watching how it made the stars that danced within it ripple.  
  
_"If it will please you, I will take you home once I have dealt with a few matters."_ Abbot spoke on a breath, finally able to make the small touch he attempted on his arrival, Impi let him cradle her cheek in the palm, leaning into it with a faint smile at the promise that could be broken at the change of the wind when Abbot finished it with a begrudged: _"Satisfied?"_  
  
Trying not to smile too openly, Impi peeked up and met Abbot's focused stare with a quiet _"Yes."_  
  
Abbot could well change his mind or conveniently forget, but it was enough that he made an effort to finally agree to grant Impi the one thing she wanted.  
  
A chance to be back among mortal men and women. To feel the sunshine on her skin again, even if only for a minute. It was enough to brighten Impi's mood.


	2. Falling Stars

* * *

* * *

Turning the feather over and over in the firelight, Impi watched how each star burned red under the flames, moving like a shooting star through the endless black of the feather until it was nothing but a black feather.  
  
  
Moving it away and dangling it upside down, letting the shadows of the room fall over it again, the stars returned. This time trickling from the stem-like falling stars until once more it shimmered like a night sky.  
  
Enchanted by the feather, Impi paced away from the fireplace, passing the door that adjoined the bedroom to Abbot's office. Ajar and letting out a hum and murmur of multiple speakers, Impi could not eavesdrop on the meeting. Not when the language was spoken was so ancient it was not even recorded in the texts of history.  
  
Occasionally there was the use of Latin. Oddly, sometimes there was Italian. Most of the time, it was a strangely lilting and delightfully sounding tongue that Impi held no hope of ever understanding.  
  
Carrying on by the door to the alcove window, Impi glimpsed the dark green flames that flickered on the candles in the candelabra. One of the candles was standing out from the rest. Not only since its wax was white in comparison to the reds and blacks of the rest, but that on its wick the tiniest but bright blue flame was burning.  
  
Staring at the small blue flame, Impi quickly checked the rest of the candles in the room. None of them was white or burned blue.  
  
Intrigued by the oddity, the strange purity of the candle, of the small flame that appeared to be struggling to burn, Impi set the feather down on the edge of the largest bed Impi ever witnessed.  
  
Hell was grandiose if nothing else. Everything was expensive looking. Gluttonous and thriving in the richest of materials. A fact that extended to the bed that was cashmere sheets and feather stuffed pillows, blankets of fine silks and Egyptian cotton, it was like sinking into a fluffy cloud when Impi went to sleep.  
  
Comfortable to the point that Impi was continually throwing things off to actually find comfort.  
  
Carefully laying the feather on one of the pillows so it would not be damaged if she forgot it was there. Impi left the bedside to inspect the little blue flame, checking that no one was in the room to witness it before she pried the white candle out of the candelabra in the very corner of the room.  
  
The wax didn't melt under the small shiver of the flame. The wick still pure white and untouched by the flame, Impi lifted it to eye level to check her eyes were not being deceived.  
  
Everything in Hell was deceptive in one way, or another and Impi learned it was best not to trust in her senses at all.  
  
Everything from sight to taste could be tricked if a person was not cautious with everything they saw, smelt, touched or tasted.  
  
It made things exciting indeed, but mostly frustrating when Impi would pick up a book only to discover it was actually a slimy-looking creature pretending to be a book.  
  
Which was why Impi held the candle with caution. Turning it carefully in case it sprung little spindly legs and scuttled across the floor.  
  
Nothing seemed off about the candle other than its colour and flame. Though the longer Impi looked at it, the more tired she became.  
  
Watching the tiny blue flame flicker was soothing. Warm and comfortable. It made Impi want to sit down or even lay down. Eyes becoming heavy, Impi sat in a soft slump on the edge of the bed, the feather left on the pillow slipping away and onto the stone floor. Impi didn't seem to notice it, not when her eyes started to flutter closed and the candle fell from her hands.  
  
Impi's was eyes snapped open again when the crash of a wave breaking on a shoreline stole away the heavy warmth she felt while staring into the tiny blue flame.  
  
Everything was an off white colour. Foggy almost but with an iridescent shimmer. If there was a Sun, it was hidden behind the hazy like sky, but the warmth was that of a tropical island. Toes wriggling on the white sands she stood upon, Impi watched the creamy white waters roll over the sands, leaving behind a bright glittering like there were diamonds in the sand.  
  
It was a surreal place.  
  
Forced to hold back her hair when a great gust of warm air blew from behind, Impi scrunched her eyes against the particles of sand that were picked up, skimming over her bare skin, tickling it and forcing her to open her eyes and look down.  
  
No longer in a floor-length dress, Impi was wearing a much, much shorter one. Low cut and barely skimming her thighs, Impi let go of her hair when she touched her neck. There was a twisted metal chain around Impi's neck, and she picked the pendant that dangled from it up in her fingers.  
  
It was a feather. A tiny one. White with scatters of grey glittering that caught in the odd daylight.  
  
Pausing in inspecting the strange feather when a large but warm hand closed on Impi's shoulder, she found herself calmly relaxing under the touch. Like it was expected, wanted even.  
  
There was not even a strangeness invoked when a set of large and dirty white wings closed around her, drawing her backwards when they curled around.  
  
All Impi could think was that they were impressive but far smaller than the wings Abbot possessed.  
  
Turned somehow by the wings that sealed her in, Impi stretched out her fingers when she was faced by a bare but gold kissed chest. The skin looking like it could be touched by a thin layer of sweat, it was smooth under her touch.  
  
There was no mistaking the entity as male, his aura strangely balanced between malevolence and benevolence. An evil that was not entirely evil. There was a strange familiarity with the sensation.  
  
_"Like a moth to a flame."_  
  
Eyes scattering up to the face of the man when he spoke, Impi's breath caught in the back of her throat.  
  
It was the depth of the man's eyes that left Impi breathless. They were the colour of dark chocolate ringed by hazel honey, a well of secrets that had no bottom. Jaw chiselled in sharp fine lines that were shadowed by a closely trimmed beard.   
  
Impi guessed that she must have fallen asleep while waiting for Abbot to finish his meeting. That the strange whitewashed, the iridescence of the place was a subconscious wish to be in an area that was not an endless night.   
  
Though the ridiculously handsome man was a surprise.   
  
_"Moth to a...?"_ Starting to repeat the age-old saying and the first thing the man said, his voice deep with a slight husk, Impi stopped when the man curled his fingers beneath her chin, tilting it up.   
  
He came in close, a sly grin on his handsome face, Impi could feel his breath on her skin. It was cold and prickling. Coming with sharp stabbing pain like her cheeks were being brushed by glass.   
  
Flinching back, Impi's bare shoulders were tickled by the man's off white wings cloaking her.   
  
_"Where do you think you're going?"_ The man purred into Impi's ear. _"I have waited a lifetime to find you."_ His fingers moved from under her chin, stroking over her neck.   
  
His touch was like fire in contrast to the sharpness of his breath. Yet somehow it sent a shiver through her body. Like a shock of electric going through her.   
  
It took the tingle of warmth between her thighs to realise that his touch was arousing.   
  
Arousing enough that when his lips brushed over her lips, neck and shoulder that she didn't stop it.   
  
It was only a dream, after all.   
  
Melting almost into the stranger of a man's touches, Impi let her eyes close, breath hitching, it stopped altogether when the distant rattle of chains running together broke Impi from the heat of the man's lips over her skin.  
  
Something was tugging on Impi's being. Pulling her away from the dream man and his tender embracing.   
  
Then, like she was falling through the air, Impi's whole body jolted. Stirring her from sleep with a heart-pumping fright.   
  
Breathing softly but raggedly, Impi's eyes sprung open when something hot and wet dripped over her fingers.   
  
The white candle was melting. The small and puttering blue flame from before replaced by a rapid engulfing inferno that threatened to scorch her hands if she didn't let it go.   
  
Fingers coated by an off white wax that shimmered in the weak shiver of the green candlelight, Impi dropped the candle a second before the blue flame blistered away the last of the candle in her hands in time with the large door that connected to Abbot's office swung open.   
  
Stunned when the candle vanished with the same crashing roar she heard in the dream when the waves broke on the sand, Impi inspected her fingers.   
  
There was no wax. No melted ball of it left behind by the candle—no scent of burning. There was nothing. Like the candle never existed.   
  
Were it not for the fact she was living in literal Hell, Impi believed she would have been far more concerned.   
  
Now, Impi only thought it was another trick of the unpredictable realm she was living in.   
  
Lowering her hands when the brush of Abbot's wing touched the fingertips, Impi disliked how he could move without creating a single sound. It was too easy to be caught off guard or crept upon.   
  
_"I was going to offer to take you above,"_ Abbot held a spike of irritation, but his touch was tender when he stroked back Impi's hair. _"You were asleep for almost a day. So I will have to postpone it until later."_  
  
Soothed by Abbot's touch. The soft comfort of his wing, Impi at first thought he was making another excuse not to let her visit the mortal world. Until the mention of how long she was asleep.   
  
Half a day spent asleep, and yet Impi felt like she hadn't slept at all in a day.  
  
She was exhausted now that she was in Abbot's presence, and she wanted to pin the blame of it on her being pregnant. Though it felt like the wrong thing to blame.   
  
Impi hadn't left the bedroom, and she was sure the place she visited and the man who came to her was all a dream.   
  
Bewildered, Impi brushed back her hair and mumbled: _"I need to sleep."_ Before laying down, burying her face in the pillow when Abbot objected: _"Again?"_  
  
No matter what Abbot said before, Impi did not feel like she had slept at all even though she was sure she dreamt up the place she visited. Dreamt up the man with dirty white wings and eyes that seemed to host endless secrets.   
  
So why was she so tired?   
  



	3. Endure

* * *

* * *

Impi was only a step behind Abbot when a gust of air forced her to scrunch close her eyes.  
  
When it was gone Impi tested, opening one before opening the other.  
  
Finally taken above and to the mortal world, Impi almost cried when the warmth of the sun-brushed her skin. At being surrounded by people. Seeing a world that was not fresh out of a nightmare.  
  
Abbot warned Impi not to wander off. To stay close to his side.  
  
Impi did exactly what Abbot asked right up to the moment the wind picked up, and she closed her eyes to keep dust or dirt getting in them.  
  
So why was Impi staring up at an effigy of the Virgin Mary?  
  
Staring around the Cathedral that she was somehow whisked away and into within a second, Impi's confusion became panic.  
  
Standing on the consecrated ground while carrying the spawn of Satan should have been impossible.  
  
There was a heaviness in Impi's body. A weight from something applying pressure from the nape of her neck down into her shoulders, arms and through her legs. Painfully lethargic, Impi realised she couldn't move. Stuck in place by an unseen force that was pinning her to stand in the very spot, she opened her eyes and found herself.  
  
There was no natural light even though it was the middle of the day. No shadows were cast by the candles that the flames  
didn't flicker upon.  
  
Regardless of the rising panic of being inside a cathedral or not being able to move, Impi knew she was not alone in the holy place.  
  
Someone was walking closer. Staying outside the reach of Impi's periphery and laughing breathily while their steps echoed from the stone walls and columns confusing the direction they came from.  
  
Wary of the person and that something was rattling like it did a second before the strange dream was broken, Impi again likened the sound to chains being pulled taut, being pushed against.  
  
_"This was almost too easy."_  
  
Eyes snapping centre when the man not only spoke but appeared in the walkway between the pews Impi was stuck standing in, she couldn't comprehend why her eyes started to stream tears. Weeping like she was gazing upon the purest most beautiful thing, she would ever see.  
  
There was an abrupt lightness in her body that alleviated the weight keeping her in place—a state of serenity when Impi looked upon the handsome man in a suit of black.  
  
Hands in pockets, the man wore a conniving but self-satisfied grin, head cocked back a little he regarded Impi like the prize game of a hunt.  
  
 _"Luce is getting sloppy."_ He tutted. _"After millennia's he finally has a mortal vessel to carry his herald and-,"_ he took his hands out the trouser pockets, spreading them wide and almost showcasing Impi with the movement to an unseen audience. _", Here you are. Stolen right out of from under his nose."_ His words were almost swallowed with the gleeful laughter that flowed from his mouth like soft and sweet music.  
  
It was the laughter that let Impi identity which - or instead what - she was in the presence of.  
  
An Angel.  
  
This man who looked like he was cut from the same cloth as every demon Impi met, was an angel.  
  
They were not beings of kindness or compassion as everyone was led to believe. They were capricious. Manipulative. Serving only themselves and their father. Collecting humans in very much the same way Lucifer gathered his minions.   
  
The same theories just different methods.   
  
They used fear of eternal damnation where Lucifer would offer their greatest desire and let them taste it before collecting his payment.   
  
Angels were not saintly. Their goal was for one thing and one thing only. To rule over the humans and eradicate their most significant contender for that; Lucifer.   
  
At least, that was how Abbot portrayed them. How he spoke about them. Tried to sway Impi's thinking that he was not as terrible as he genuinely was by comparison.   
  
Impi could recall with ease one of the most profound things Abbot ever told her - beyond his admission he was The Devil.   
  
_"I can not make a man do what is against his nature. I can not make him take a life if it is not already in him to do that. I did not create evil in man. I only exploit it."_  
  
Being told that the Devil only exploited the evil that was already within humankind was at first impossible to believe. It went against everything that she knew. Was told about how Lucifer coerced, tricked, lied or forced people into doing bad things.  
  
The more evil perpetrated the stronger Lucifer became. The more clandestine his grip over humankind was. Swaying people away from God, and faith, and righteousness.   
  
The only truth - as Abbot told Impi - was that he despised the faithful and delighted in giving them as much hassle as he was capable.   
  
God, as Abbot once said, was the greatest hypocrite of them all for placing temptation before Adam and Eve only to punish his own creations for giving in to the human nature that God himself created within them.   
  
All Abbot ever did was ask Eve why would God place the tree and not allow them its fruits.   
  
What was its purpose of being there if it was forbidden and to never be touched?   
  
Why make it at all?   
  
Why create something that would cause suffering and turmoil in front of a being who was capable of defying the word of its creator?   
  
Most importantly - interestingly - why did God not allow Adam and Eve redemption for their defiance?   
  
Only to cast them out for not obeying a dictator who set them up to fall into temptation from the start.   
  
Humans, by nature, were curious and curiousness was impossible to ignore forever.   
  
Which led Impi to question who was the real evil of the world.   
  
The man who created mankind or the one who exploited the evil harboured in it since their creation.   
  
Thinking over all that Impi was told against what she thought and knew, it left her wary of the Angel who was laughing at her. A being who was supposed to be a kind and gentle person who took Impi against her will stood more like a demon than an Angel.   
  
Even when the spread of his large dove-like wings stretched out from his shoulders, shimmering and glittering with the purest white did he look like a man who was capable of goodwill and merciful.   
  
There was anger, self-righteousness, pride, vanity, and hate within his aura that bled from his presence over the stone and wood they stood within.   
  
Whether this Angel was a rogue one or he was an accurate depiction of his ilk, Impi could not be sure. Regardless of which it was, Impi could see that whatever reason she was brought before this man was not going to be for a pleasant little talk.   
  
The man held a purpose, and it was not to be kind or merciful or attempt to understand the situation Impi managed to find herself in.  
  
Not when he lifted a hand, and with finger and thumb drawing down on what first appeared like nothing, they closed together and pinched the tip of a large, rusted, blood-stained nail.   
  
Eyes illuminated under the glow of his wings, he smiled in pure lunacy. Baring all his teeth, his pupils became pinpricks.   
  
_"If the vessel of the herald is dead. This war can not start."_ The man cooed like he was wooing a lover, stroking the nail between his fingers. _"This nail was the very one driven into the left hand of Jesus Christ, it is stained by his blood."_ He looked upon the nail lovingly, caressing the indentations with his fingers on the stained piece of iron.   
  
By instinct, Impi tried to touch her stomach. Cover it. Shield it somehow even though she knew it would be pointless.   
  
Impi couldn't move though. The pressure she felt the second her eyes opened and fixed her in place was more potent than before.   
  
Impi was a sitting duck to the genuine danger the Angel posed.   
  
Not even her tongue would move to try and talk the Angel out of his intentions and being inside consecrated grounds meant that Abbot was not about to show up.   
  
Stuck and incapable of moving to even try and stop the nail thrown towards her chest by the overly gleeful Angel, Impi could only stare at the blunted shaft of metal crudely made into a nail as it glided with deadly force and intent.   
  
Abbot warned Impi over and over again that until the baby was born, that being within the mortal world would be dangerous for her. That if Heaven could stop the birth of the herald by any means, they would do it. They would only try to bring Impi to their side as a last resort.   
  
An odd way to go about things, but who was Impi to question the methods of the followers of God?   
  
Knowing that they couldn't kill Lucifer's child directly was no relief. Not with knowing all the Angels could hope to do to achieve their goal was to destroy the vessel that carried it.   
  
Which meant that Impi was their sole target.   
  
A target trapped in place and who could do nothing but watch in agonisingly slow motion the instrument that would kill her fly towards her chest.   
  
Impi couldn't even make some effort to spare herself the fate of her death.   
  
The nail drew closer and behind the silence of the Cathedral, the Angel and his lunatic grinning, Impi heard the rattling and clanging of chains; Again.  
  
Metal striking metal made an awful, ear aching sound typically, but this was on a whole other level.   
  
It made Impi's jaw clench and her bones throb. The grinding, crunching, rattling and clanging of what sounded like large metal link chains grew tempestuous; and by the Angels incensed face Impi was not the only one who could hear it.   
  
_"Impossible! Inconceivable!"_ The Angel screamed, spreading out his wings with such a fit of tremendous anger that they broke the wooden pews, sending chunks of wood and stone flying into the air, piercing the purest white Impi ever saw of his wings with splinters; making them bleed.   
  
Fingers clawed at his front, the Angels eyes burned away the soft blue of his irises to black in his unbridled rage.   
  
_"No!"_ A single thunderous bellow came from his puffed-up chest, his breathing sharp and ragged and his body trembling.   
  
Lost over what caused the Angel to lose his mind in his anger that he started to throw anything that his hands could grab, Impi for a second lost focus on the nail.   
  
Trying to find it in the blizzard of broken wood and stone and paper that the Angel kicked up in his fury, Impi found an outstretched hand instead.   
  
Abbot stood side-on in between two pews, arm reaching outward, his wings pinched unnaturally close to his back he appeared sickly pale in the face.   
  
Pierced through the palm by the nail, Abbot flexed his fingers like he was testing their manoeuvrability. The skin around the nail crumbling and flaking black, a thin circle of white light spreading outward from the skin penetrated by the nail, burning away the flesh.  
  
Though Abbot appeared gaunt in the face and his body shook horribly, he still portrayed an air of confidence and arrogance when he plucked the nail out like it was not burning his flesh when he touched it. Leaving the fingers smoking like hot coals.   
  
_"I can enter holy grounds."_ Abbot flicked away the nail like it was a piece of dirt and not one of the three that nailed Christ to the cross. _"I only choose not to."_ His smile was colder than any time before when he flicked it towards the Angel who stood panting when his fury seemed to tire him out.   
  
Abbot's words appeared enough to refuel the Angel when he picked up a good-sized chunk of stone and with no real aim launched it towards Abbot.   
  
A flick of the hand knocked it aside with a cockiness that was only matched by the mocking and relaxed stance in which Abbot stood even though only a second ago he looked ready to keel over.   
  
_"Temper, temper."_ Abbot tutted, wagging an ashen finger, the skin returning faster than it could be burned away. _"Whatever would father say if he could see you now?"_ He mused with a soft chuckle, stepping out of the pew to stand more central of the walkway.   
  
Shielded by Abbot's back, and by the ruffling spread of his wings, Impi's breath came back in one rushed moment when it finally dawned on her that she was spared death by a mere inch.   
  
The black oil slick of Abbot's blood burning on her skin warning Impi how narrowly he made the interception.   
  
No longer trapped in paralysis, Impi was struck by the reality of how close she came to death when the Angel sneered back to Abbot's mockery.  
  
_"You're looking awfully pale, Luce. Don't push your luck; we both know this will end in my favour."_  
  
True to Angel's word, Abbot was shaky on his feet, and he couldn't keep them still. Like he was severely agitated; or in pain.   
  
Free to move with the slow waning shock of how close she was to death, Impi touched one of Abbot's wings with the very tips of her fingers. They faded right through.   
  
Stunned by it, Impi curled back the hand at the same moment, Abbot whispered: _"Run."_ Over his shoulder.   
  
For some reason looking down rather than up when it was ordered for Impi to flee, she didn't linger a second longer.   
  
Ignoring the aches that spread throughout her body the instance she moved, Impi turned away and ran for the doors at the back of the Cathedral, shouldering it open and spilling out in a chaotic tripping sprint.  
  
Abbot was not physically present in the Cathedral, and he couldn't maintain the mirage much longer to allow Impi to escape.   
  
Outside and under the sun again, Impi didn't waste a second longer to appreciate how warm it was on her skin when she rushed for the iron gate at the end of the pathway when her run was chased by a howling screech from the Cathedral.   
  
The Angel was not going to be fooled for long, and so, with an energy Impi guessed was from self-preservation spurring her forward, she rushed through the gates with a hand outstretched to catch Abbot's waiting palm.   
  
Winded from the run and the fear of her almost death it became an abrupt onset of tears when Impi buried her face in Abbot's chest, a single hand reaching around his back to brush the silk body of a wing.   
  
The softness on her palm soothing far more than the firmness of Abbot's chest.   
  
_"I need to lay down."_ Was all Abbot said, his voice barely a whisper when he stepped back, unveiling that they were no longer outside the Cathedral but in Abbot's home when he lived like he was a mortal man?   
  
Never once hearing Abbot sound so exhausted, Impi couldn't question it over the surprise when he slumped down on the leather sofa, draping an arm over his eyes while his chest heaved.   
  
Like he appeared in the Cathedral Abbot was pale-faced, but under the dim lighting, he was clammy too.   
  
Never thinking that coming to Impi's rescue would be so gruelling on Abbot, a twinge of guilt struck her chest when he waved her over, motioning for her to kneel down beside him.   
  
Abbot would never have been in the state that he was if Impi only listened to his warnings and was not so petulant about wanting to come back to earth.   
  
Unsure if an apology would mean anything, Impi stayed quiet while she knelt down beside the sofa. Head hanging in shame for the unnecessary trouble and discomfort she caused Abbot for wanting to come home, Impi raised her head when Abbot lifted the arm dangling over the edge of the sofa, and his hand tapped beneath her chin.   
  
Expecting to find Abbot glowering back at Impi a rapid lurch of her chest made her whole body jolt when her eyes settled on what was between his fingers.   
  
Catching in the dim light, the stars that rippled within the single feather from Abbot's wings appeared golden rather than silver when he offered it to her.   
  
Eyes watering and lip wobbling from before, Impi hiccuped back a sob when she took the feather from Abbot, leaning into the palm of his hand when it curled over her cheek, guiding her head to lay down on his chest.   
  
Keeping the preciously gifted feather close, Impi burrowed deeply into Abbot's chest, wanting to hide while all the same wanting the comfort of his arms she bleated a tiny apology. Keeping it small and short only to stop from descending into a deluge of tearful apologies. 

_"I should think today is a testament to why I have kept you from this place."_ Abbot ran his fingers over Impi's cheek. _"That rather than being sorry, you will understand everything I have done and will do is for you and our unborn child."_ His tone was coarse, spiked by agitation. _"I have never stepped on or inside the consecrated ground in this body for no one. Do not make me do it again."_

Falling into silence, Impi absorbed Abbot's short reprimand word by word, letter by letter. 

Was Abbot a normal mortal man, Impi might have found them a little endearing, tender though angrily made? 

Abbot was not a mortal man and Impi instead was reminded that she was a vessel for his seed. A woman who's only importance was to birth his child and align with him in the war that was to come once she gave birth.   
He would do and say all that he needed to keep Impi in the illusion that she was something more to him than the greatest weapon in Abbot's arsenal. 

Impi loved Abbot, but she came to terms with the idea that he would never love her back. 

It was why Impi stood with the excuse that she was going to the bathroom, the feather held limply she dropped it back on Abbot's chest with a mumbled: _"Don't lose too many."_ While stepping away. 

Whether Impi wanted to provoke a more accurate reaction out of Abbot or she was bypassing the shock of almost dying to be angry over why she nearly did, she couldn't say. 

The only thing Impi knew was that denying or refusing Abbot's gifts was the only way she got under his skin and could make him show an authentic reaction towards her. One that wasn't for show or to create the illusion that he actually cared about her. 

So when Abbot lifted the arm over his eyes to stare at the feather Impi returned, the guilt came back tenfold when he twirled it in his fingers and confessed:  
  
_"I only started to give them because it made you smile. Pulling out my own feathers is excruciatingly painful. I need to take a breather after each before I bring them to you."_ He shifted to tuck the arm over his face beneath his head, twisting the feather back and forth, sending the stars in them spinning.  
  
_"Alas, against what many choose to believe, I am not incapable of understanding or experiencing human emotion. I feed on the strongest of them all. Anger, envy, sadness, lust...love."_ Abbot paused the cold astuteness of his eyes, leaving the feather to bore into Impi.  
  
  
_"If you think for a second, I would cause myself pain for the sake of a mortal woman merely to keep her placated or in some illusion. The very woman I have chosen, not predetermined by fate or prophecy, but chosen, to carry my child, then for the first time since I have existed I will have to admit I have made a grave error in judgement."_

Abbot stretched out his hand. Once again gifting Impi his feather. 

_"You seem to forget, my love",_ Abbot stressed the last word off his tongue. _"That you are the key to my own undoing. You have the literal Devil at your mercy with the power of your choice at the end of this, and you think I would have selected a woman with that power, who I would have to keep at my side for an entire year to give her my undivided attention and time, for the sake of amusing myself?"_

Abbot crooked an eyebrow sharply, contentiously. 

_"I told you before my patience is thin. I lack it in many, many things, except in choosing the right woman who I want at my side for the time I have left. For the time she will decide I have left."_ He swung his body off the sofa and in one stride, pushed the feather into Impi's chest. _"Am I sadistic? Yes."_ He dropped to an almost growl. _"A masochist?"_ Abbot took Impi's face in his hands. _"For you, I will endure what I must if it means that you love me."_


	4. Comfort

* * *

* * *

Only when Abbot mentioned that Impi held his fate in her hands did the actual depth of what she was involved in gain clarity.  
  
Should Impi side against, Abbot then it could be his death. Impi thought it was only mankind’s survival that depended on how she chose to proceed. Not Abbot also.  
  
It gave Impi much to think about. A whole new perspective that was never considered before. Opening entire other thoughts that Impi didn’t bring into contemplation.  
  
Impi was the expectant mother of Lucifer’s child. The Herald of the End of Days. The Anti-Christ.  
  
It was a whole lot more than Impi truly allowed depth of thought for. Impi was going to birth the successor of the Morning Star.  
  
The father of Impi’s child was the personification of evil. Able to invoke the darkest desires of men and women. Who traded a soul to let a person have a taste in their greatest desire. Who saw to it that acting on the nefarious impulses was punished through endless tormenting.  
  
Abbot was the embodiment of evil as man knew it, but he made every single one of them pay eternally for it.  
  
It left Impi torn over her perception of good and evil. Wrong and right.  
  
Was it wrong to love this entity?  
  
To be overwhelmingly happy to be told that Impi was not some ill-fated mistress and mother of evil but chosen. Selected to bare Lucifer’s child. To be wanted and, dare Impi to believe the master of lies, be loved by him.  
  
Impi’s moral compass was off-kilter when Abbot confessed that he would suffer anything if it was repaid with Impi loving him.  
  
There was no grander or excessive declaration a person could make. That they would endure all if it meant they were loved.  
  
The more Impi thought about it, the sadder the statement became. Even if it was careful trickery, it was painful to think that it was spoken. That there were genuine people who would go through - ironically - hell to be loved by a person who may never love them back. Who would exploit the person for personal gain while never truly reciprocating that person wishes, desires, or feelings?  
  
No one had to reciprocate, but some people would see it as a means to gain all they could for nothing.  
  
Something Impi would never do to a person. Not even the Devil. Impi entered the relationship with Abbot with an honest heart and intent. Though Abbot’s motivation was self-serving, Impi wanted to think that the openness he displayed was honesty. No games or tricks to better improve his chances when the time came for Impi to make her choice.  
  
Withdrawing out her thoughts, her head for a respite from thinking, Impi continued to stroke Abbot’s wings while he dozed in her lap. Self-indulgent in the oddest ways, Abbot was not subtle by any means when he wanted Impi’s attention. It was only due to trying to become comfortable with the concept, Abbot possessed a set of impressive wings that were darker than night but were painted by stars, that Impi stroked them.  
  
The very first-time Impi assumed Abbot allowed it to let her sate her curiosity. Then it became clear that Abbot enjoyed it in the same way a human liked their back being stroked when he asked for Impi to do it again.  
  
In what seemed like no time at all, Abbot would ask for it almost every day. It came every time like a demand rather than actually being asked. Impi could only liken it to Abbot being embarrassed.   
  
Regardless, Abbot was calm. Since the cathedral and being pierced by a holy relic, Abbot was sluggish and lethargic. There was no colour in his face, but his brow lost its crease, his mouth relaxing from its pinch the longer Impi ran her fingers through the silky night that spread across his shoulders.   
  
If not for knowing that Abbot only slept one night in a year, Impi could believe by a look alone that he was fast asleep. Taking the hand away, a smile teased her lips when Abbot lifted a wing, pushing it back into the palm of her hand. Impi lifted her hand again. Biting back a laugh when Abbot raised his wing again, Impi stretched back her arms. Resting on the floor.   
  
Watching Abbot fold away his wings they vanished like their being there was nothing but smoke and mirrors, he turned over when the last wisp faded.  
  
_“I hate to admit this,”_ Abbot almost yawned, catching it last minute, _“I need to rest.”_ Hazel speckled green eyes half-lidded, he wiggled the fingers of the hand that was stabbed. _“This afternoon took more out of me than I thought it would.”_   
  
Inspecting Abbot’s hand, Impi’s brow quirked to find a crisscross like a brand in the centre of his palm. The skin was bloodied and weeping. Raw to the naked eye, the edges of the skin welted.   
  
_“It will heal.”_ Abbot smiled like it was nothing. _“A few hours recuperating will help.”_ Lowering the hand to his chest, a glint of something catching in the light, Impi cocked her head. Knowing well, the look Abbot was giving.   
  
It was the very same look Abbot turned on Impi the night she fell pregnant. Not that Impi could fall pregnant again.   
  
Which was why Impi accepted Abbot’s advance. The peppering kisses that scorched a path over her shoulder and up her neck, fingers tangling in her hair, twisting it to pull back her head, using it to guide her to the floor. It was cold on her back, Abbot’s hand like fire when it filled the arch of her back, pushing them chest to chest.   
  
Wrapping her legs around Abbot, drawing him closer, Impi’s lips parted in a soft gasp when he bit on her neck.   
  
Eyes opening, Impi‘s breath stilled.   
  
There was no ceiling above and only a shimmering, iridescent sky. A warm breeze carried the sound of waves breaking on the shoreline—Sands warm beneath her.   
  
Back in the strange place that Impi was convinced she dreamt about, she could not even fathom how she came to be here again. Confident that she was not asleep, Impi also knew she was not alone.  
  
Laying with her head in the lap of the same man she met before, there was no sense of panic or fear.  
  
Only calmness washed over Impi when the man smiled down at her. The off white wings missing from his shoulders.  
  
_“Hello again,”_ he ran a hand through Impi’s hair. _“Little moth.”_


	5. Not An Actual Chapter

* * *

* * *

I forgot to place this in, but here is the song for this series.   
  


https://open.spotify.com/track/21oivHKJh5YHf84Q5r9A3v?si=9-s-hO9tQxq_7dndAVgg3g  
  


and yes, the irony is slightly intentional 

😂


	6. Touch

* * *

* * *

Impi couldn’t explain it.   
  
  
Back to chest with the unknown malevolent yet the somehow benevolent man, Impi was sure that she never experienced such vividly erotic dreams before. Neither did Impi have them when knowing that she was not actually asleep.  
  
There was a second set of hands on Impi’s skin that moved over the sensitively sweet spots that she couldn’t see. They moved in opposite intent to the set Impi could see.   
  
Pleasure extracted by the double, Impi’s mind was in chaos over which to respond. Body overloaded by every single touch and caress and stroke, there came a painful note to each one when they overlapped briefly like wires sparking on her skin.   
  
With one leg cupped by the thigh and balanced in the palm of the dirty white-winged man’s hand, Impi couldn’t even fathom her mind let alone how she came to be sitting in his lap and lapping up the burn of his fingers that dipped deeply into her.   
  
She became confused when he asked if she wanted him to stop.  
  
Bottom lip bit on, Impi’s body contorted in a way she was sure she would never achieve. Back arced so profoundly that she was able to meet the hot-blooded stare of the man behind, Impi’s breath was stolen when he curled a hand under her chin, the kiss like that of a ravenous beast with the overindulgence of his lust. Impi wanted all of it.  
  
In a careful and practised lean back, Impi followed direction without any direction when she held the muscular shoulders of the man, his hands on her waist and guiding their bodies together. On top in reverse was not a new position for Impi. What was new was the utter shock of clashing temperatures within her.   
  
Hot and cold meeting equally there was no cancellation of the other.   
  
It shocked Impi’s whole body into paralysis.   
  
_“Toiling with Lucifer’s woman?”_ A man chuckled darkly from somewhere. _“Brave of you, forsaken one.”_  
  
Spurred into a limber state by the injection of a foreign voice, Impi threw herself forward, a violent cold hitting against her chest and stealing her breath. She didn’t even know her eyes were closed until they became screwed up in a wince after her body shuddered to a blistering climax.  
  
It hurt. In the absence of the cold and left with a fire scorching hot within her sensitive body, Impi was in agony like none she ever felt before.  
  
Breaking from the body that hurt her with a rushed need to part from it, Impi coiled in cool sheets while the fire in her body puttered out so rapidly that she was left unsure if it was even there.   
  
It must have been. There was no other reason for the stream of tears that dampened the arm her face was pressed with force into. Trying to handle the pain by any means, Impi had laid face down and on her knees. A hand over her stomach and reaching lower to the sweltering and unpleasant inferno’s point of origin.   
  
_“Impi.”_ Abbot’s voice was terse and bordering insulted. Though it came with a little pandering touch on her head. _“Did I hurt you?”_ He asked, somewhat baffled, like he never had something like it happen before.   
  
Nodding while keeping her face buried in the crumpled sheets, Impi focused on trying to regain order to her breathing. The previous blaze on her skin becoming a wickedly delightful ebbing ache.   
  
So awfully confused by the rapid switch in bodily responses. Over the idea that she dreamed of another man while indulging in Abbot.   
  
Left in a soft panting, Impi turned on her arm to peek up at Abbot.  
  
As their eyes met a single dirty white feather drifted between them. Spinning around and somehow managed to come across mocking. Enough so that Abbot’s face contorted into a rage and he ripped the feather from the air, creating a gale-force wind when his wings sprung up in a way that matched his face.  
  
Never seeing Abbot like it before, Impi recoiled on the bed in the same breath, Abbot turned the feather to smoke and ash, his eyes burning black when they turned on her, and he seethed.   
  
_“When did you enter Purgatory?!”_


	7. Serpentine

* * *

* * *

Were it not for the literal snake eyes and a forked tongue that flicked from her smiling lips, Impi would never have thought the woman who crawled over Abbot's lap like a feline, was human.

From the second Abbot turned the off-white feather to ash and demanded to know when Impi entered purgatory, the woman appeared in a flourish. 

Almost like she was waiting for this very moment. She seemed to know a lot about Impi entering purgatory. Whispering in a hiss with her snake tongue into Abbot's ear with a language Impi could never hope to comprehend. Not literally at least. Impi understood enough that what the woman hissed and purred in Abbot's ear left him far more angered than when the feather fluttered and flicked from the ceiling. 

The woman Impi suspected was a Demon fawned over Abbot, pawing at him and being sure that Impi saw every single second. Abbot appeared far more consumed by what he was being told than what the woman was doing. Impi was concerned with both. 

All Impi could do was pray - ironically - that the woman knew nothing about the more sexual aspects of the visit to purgatory. 

When Impi entered the space, it felt like a dream, and so her actions were innocently led. 

Not once did Impi think she was cavorting with a Fallen. An angel neither condemned nor redeemed but somewhere in-between. Though Impi knew that she should have taken the man's wings as a warning that something more was going on, she didn't ever claim to be the brightest woman at times. She was human. She made errors. 

Impi recoiled deeper in the chair when something the she-demon said irked Abbot. Enough that his wings stiffened at his back, the feathers bristling like the hackles of a dog, and he lifted the burnt to black stare off the floor to level with Impi's. 

_"Go",_ Abbot ordered, a split second of confusion making Impi believe that Abbot was speaking to her, 

A palpation disturbed her chest until, with the same ease a person would pick away a piece of dust, Abbot plucked the she-demon off his lap, discarding her to the floor. "Your jealousy still knows no bounds, Lilith. It bores me." He dismissed the she-demon brusquely and in a way that his manner reflected his words. 

Lilith screeched contrition, the fork of her tongue no longer short and befitting her mouth, it grew barbs when she was ignored by Abbot. Back turning on Lilith when Abbot stood, not even the lashing on his wings with her barbaric tongue roused his interest; but he did snap his wings open. Creating a booming gust that sent the she-demon tumbling over herself and away; vanishing in black flames and coal dust. 

Lilith? 

The Mother of Demons if Impi's memory served her well. The first wife of Adam who refused to be subservient to her husband. Impi at the minimal could admire Lilith as the first feminist in some respect. 

_"If I am to believe her forked tongue."_ Abbot was pacing, and his rapture of Impi's attention was clandestine. _"Then you have been rolling in the sands of that tainted place with Samyaza."_ The accusation came like an ice arrow straight to her chest. _"I ill advise lying to the king of lies, my love."_ Taking a firm but gentle grip on Impi's chin it tilted her face to meet with the cindering stare Abbot meted upon her. _"The little feather gift he left tells me enough that you stepped foot on that putrid land, now all I want to know,_ " Abbot leaned in closer, voice dropping to a rasping whisper. _"Is what were you doing there?"_

Impi was sure she would have broken out in a sweat if not for how cold Abbot's stare - and question - left her. Ice crackled through her veins, and she was sure her breath came in clouded bursts as her lungs froze, mind whirring on how to answer the question without trying to deceive the master of deception. 

_"I don't know."_ Impi chose vague honesty. _"I woke up in a place I had never seen. I thought it was a dream."_ That was Impi's perception of the milky iridescent space she found herself in. It wasn't a lie at all. Though if it was enough to sate Abbot's curiosity was something she would have to wait and find out. There was no movement in Abbot's face when she answered. It was like his face was carved from marble. Realistic, but petrified. Stuck in place for eternity. 

Trying not to fidget or become nervous, the suggestion made that the space Impi woke in was real and not a dream, she believed she might become the only woman since humans existed stupid enough to cheat on the Devil. Intentional or not, Impi could hear the screaming of her subconscious mind naming her the most incredible idiot the world had ever seen. 

No one double-crossed the Devil. Only a complete fool would lay in bed with another after Lucifer set his sights upon them and staked a claim. Abbot held quite the substantial claim on Impi as well, as the apparently chosen woman to carry his demonic child in her womb. 

Finally, Abbot blinked, closing his eyes with a pinch in his brow. _"Your mind is unusual today. I can't hear a thing."_ He pondered with subtle frustration. Leaning back enough to cock his head, eyes cracking open into a suspicious squint. _"I might even have to admit that as of this moment, you have me duped."_

Duped?

Impi couldn't believe what came out Abbot's mouth. The insinuation that she managed to dupe Abbot and left him unsure if she was speaking with honesty created such a violent head spin that she didn't think much about how different her subconscious sounded when the screaming became a whisper. 

_"Samyaza?"_ The little voice sneered. Offended by the mere mention of the name. _"Lilith is as shit stirring as she is dense."_ It sighed before a low chortle broke the disgruntlement. _"It is for the better that he believes that philandering old fool is the one who you have met, little moth."_ The voice cooed sweetly, and it no longer sounded so disembodied or without gender. It was male, and Impi knew it from the milky sands that she came to learn was purgatory. _"Don't fret little moth. My being here is the only thing keeping that horned fuck from hearing about our little twilight zone coitus."_ The voice sounded pleased with itself for the successful pulling of wool over Abbot's eyes. 

Impi was not as pleased as she was relieved to think that Abbot did not know she had become a cheat. Unintentionally. 

Curious and worried about the pervasive effect of the mystery man entering her subconscious space, Impi didn't know how to stop it or how to push the man out of her head; and she had to catch herself from speaking aloud to tell him to get out of her head. An action that caught Abbot's interest when Impi made a rather grandiose display to keep her mouth shut. 

_"Calm little moth."_ The man tutted. _"Don't draw his attention to my being here, lest you want the most blinding headache from him forcing his way into your head."_ He warned, and Impi got the impression he was shaking his head. _"I came here only to give you a handy piece of advice for the next time we meet."_ There was a dangerously flirtatious way in which the man spoke. _"When you hear the chains is when he is starting to become aware of your temporary departure from the mortal coil."_ His voice was fading into a whisper, like he was standing right behind Impi, breathing each word into her ear whilst walking away. _"He can not enter purgatory, but he can force you out from it due to carrying his spawn. So remember to listen for it when we meet again."_ His voice vanished like air on the final word, and the emptiness of her head at the departure left it feeling like it was going to float off her neck. 

Bowing forward, overcome by an unexpected wooziness, Impi sunk into the safe surety of Abbot's arms when they caught her. The silk-like brush of his wings when her fingers stretched out to find them like a comforter, she willingly moved under Abbot's direction when he drew her off the chair to curl up in his arms, her legs wrapping tightly at his waist. 

The guilt from the confirmation that the place visited was not a dream was the bitterest taste on Impi's tongue, and she silently vowed that if she entered it again, she would leave it without tainting her fidelity further. 

It was not about being fearful of the repercussions for fooling the Devil himself, but because she was a fool in love with the Devil. 

So she asked something of Abbot that she never thought would ever come out her mouth. 

_"Can we go home?"_ Fluttered off her tongue in a tiny whisper while she buried her face in the burning warmth of Abbot's neck. Hell became a place safer than earth in less than a day, and, without notice, the space Impi considered home that it didn't do more than raise a smile when Abbot stressed that he despised how fickle her moods were becoming before uttering lowly. _"At least you think of it as home."_


	8. Gifts

* * *

Impi was dubiously wary of accepting the strange, stormy grey ball of fur from Abbot when he tried to gift it. 

“What is it?” Impi angled away when Abbot lifted it close enough that she could see that it was...vibrating? 

Small enough that it could sit in the palm of Abbot’s hand comfortably, he inclined his head a fraction: “A pet.” He answered with a twitch to the edge of his lips, almost smiling. 

“Pet?” Impi blinked at the smoky fur in Abbot’s palm, far more unwilling to accept it than before. 

Hell was full to spilling point of fascination and danger. It’s creatures no exception to the rule. More than Impi could count she stumbled across the wildlife of Hell and swiftly wished she never would again. 

Bitten, stung, chased by the horrific beings with more legs and eyes and teeth than any animal should ever have, Impi was left wondering if Abbot was still furious about her trip into purgatory. 

“I am,” Abbot spoke gruffly, taking Impi’s hand only almost to pour the ball of fur into her hands. “I am still not convinced you’re wholly honest either,” His ability to read Impi’s proving unwaveringly persistent. “Alas, who am I to speak of bitter feelings about being lied too?” He finished with a sharp smile. 

Awash in guilt over her lies and misunderstood infidelity, Impi dropped Abbot’s stare to focus on the vibrating ball of fur that was, if she was not mistaken, squeaking. 

Abbot called it a pet. Impi could not find anything beyond fur and soft, puppy-like whimpers, to call it anything other than a ball of fur. 

That was until two inky eyes blinked from the depths of the stormy grey fur. 

Standing in place, staring at the inky eyes, Impi’s lips broke apart to make a soft startled shout when four paws like appendages sprouted from the ball of fur into her palm. 

Abbot didn’t explain anything, choosing instead to pace back to the large leather chaise he had been lounging on before Impi entered the room. Returned to laying with one arm curled over the backrest, fingers pinching the bridge of his nose like he was under immense stress or fatigue. 

Ever since Abbot confronted Impi about entering purgatory, he was in a considerable mood. Brooding deeply and rather fouler in a temper to his subjects than normal. 

There were no gifting of his feathers. Certainly, no conversation or time spared for Impi in the days since returning to Hell that it left her even more on edge when the ball of fur started snuggling at her palm. 

Things rarely stayed cute and with good intentions in Hell. 

It was with that mindset that Impi remained holding it at almost arm's length, never taking both eyes away from it when she whispered a tiny: “Thank you.” To Abbot.

He stopped rubbing his eyes when Impi spoke, flicking up the thumb to turn a sidelong look on her. 

“I have never apologised for a single thing since I existed,” Abbot stated cuttingly. “Neither do I adjust my behaviour to suit anyone.” The hand fell from his face, suspending over the backrest. “However I have been told that does not tend to go over well with mortal women and to make amends for it to keep you in my favour.” He sounded dulled by the concept and looked it also. 

The logic was warped and rather misconstrued as to why Abbot gifted Impi a Hell puppy, but she thought it best not to bring it up when it was apparent that Abbot was uncomfortable. 

Impi never would believe in her life she would be being given an odd Hell dog as an apology from the Devil himself. 

It was a little humbling as it was terrible to think he thought he was somehow in the wrong. 

Abbot’s behaviour as of late was not the best but far from terrible considering what he suspected Impi to have done.

The worst part was Abbot’s thinking was not wrong.

So it felt terrible when Impi forced a smile and murmured: “It was sage advice.”

Eyes cold and astute fixed upon Impi it was accompanied by a stiff smile, and a drawled: “Don’t test me. Not today.”

Swallowing back a little breath, Impi dropped Abbot’s stare to fix on the creature in her hands that she decided was a Hell puppy. It was round and oddly shaped but somehow endearing when it turned its inky eyes on Impi.

Knowing it before, but affirmed of it then that she was truly out of her depth with the magnitude of her purpose, Impi started to make her departure from the room. 

Stopped before she even actually managed a step, Impi’s heart fluttered when the silky brush of Abbot’s wings enveloped her. The warm press of Abbot’s hands crossing paths over her stomach, drawing her into his chest, Impi bit back the small sob when a kiss tickled her shoulder, and Abbot reminded her why she was the one carrying his child.

“I love you,” Abbot spoke tenderly, between small kisses.


	9. Little Teeth

* * *

The Hell pup fell on its side; again. 

Oddly proportioned. It was not designed to walk but waddle, it tired out quickly - after ten steps - and would flip on its side and take a breather. 

Though Impi suspected it figured out that she would pick it up and carry it when she was trying to be somewhere. 

That afternoon - Impi started to assign times to the endless night - was no exception when she bent down and scooped up the panting ball of fur and tucked it under her arm. 

Flinching away when one of the Gargoyles prowled over the railing of the outer corridor, its moss-covered stone rippling under the black moon, Impi avoided looking at it directly. 

Beyond the Gargoyles stone wings, more human-looking guards filed from the castle. Dressed in all black armour and only defined by the splash of colour that suggested ranks, Impi could see that the man at the helm of the formation had a luminous emerald green scored breastplate. 

Hell was in an uproarious afternoon since an owl with a golden arrow in its wing crashed into Impi’s bedroom whilst she was in the middle of another medical examination. 

The long needle-like nails of the midwife froze when she saw the golden arrow and her face - which changed from a tear-inducing beauty in the light, to a scream drawing horror in shadow - became something even a nightmare could not imagine. 

The midwives whole mouth split open like a Venus trap. Showing more teeth than was comfortable to witness, the midwife screeched. 

Impi was trying to take care of the wounded owl when the midwife screamed so loudly that Impi almost passed out unawares that the arrow in the Owls wing was a warning that someone had entered Hell.

Impi remained unaware until the entire Castle kicked into a furious race to discover who or what entered Hell. 

The Gargoyles that Impi once believed were only stone decoration cracked and scraped into life, prowling the castle's perimeter. Shadowy masses that in a single glance looked like large dogs before a blink blurred the illusion entered the courtyards, moving in packs outward of its grounds. 

It was how Impi came to be outside her room. One Hell puppy under one arm, and a magnificent Owl of black hooting miserably on her shoulder; his wing bandaged and keeping him from flying. 

When the owl crashed into the room, Impi saw the arrow somehow knowing to snap it before trying to remove it, made to help the owl. 

The midwife stopped her screaming when Impi made to touch the arrow. Roughly gripping Impi by the shoulder and throwing her backwards with a hissed: “Don’t touch it!” Before she tore the arrow away with no concern for the Owl or how it hooted terribly and flapped desperately. 

The arrow had set alight in the midwives hand. Blistering and bubbling her skin. 

The midwife showed it no concern when she tore out the window - not the door - and like she became the rags she often wore, flapped across the sky to one of the many spires of the castle. 

Stunned by the chaotic situation and how little Impi knew of what was actually happening, she left her bedroom a second before the door could slam itself shut and seal itself. 

Thinking that the door was supposed to lock Impi inside while Hell sought out the invaders to its domain, she defied it. 

Picking up what she knew from the harsh whispers that spread through castle corridors, Impi followed the paths towards the castle's main hall. 

Now on the outer side of the castle, Impi could see what lay beyond it. 

Multiple tunnels of light broke the endless darkness in the distance. Almost but not quite a complete sheet of pure white light spread on the west side of the castle, reaching around in an almost semi-circle. 

There were shadows in the tunnels of light descending to the earth; there was absolutely no subtlety in the approach.

Looking up when the owl made a small wilting hoot, Impi met its onyx eyes curiously. 

The Hell Puppy too made a whimpering like it was scared of what was going on. 

The two creatures' concern overshadowed the Gargoyle that doubled back and slipped off the railing it was prowling with the same finesse of a panther on the hunt. 

The large stone coming closer. The carved eyes scraping and scratching in the sockets, the two overgrown teeth that hooked up over its top lip softened by centuries of moss growth, Impi jumped in surprise when it nudged her thigh; pushing her backwards. 

The pushing became more insistent. Each one was stronger than the last that finally, Impi was forced to take a step back to avoid falling over. 

The backtracking led Impi back into a darkened room. The candles staying unlit when the Gargoyle’s stone scraped over the floor and crossed into the room. 

Something was off about the Gargoyle. For one, it was vibrating so strongly that the moss that grew on its carved body shook loose. 

Realising a little too late that she was trapped when the door was kicked closed by the Gargoyle’s clawed foot, Impi wished the Owl stayed on her shoulder rather than finding enough energy to flap away to land on something higher. 

The stone beast was growling deeply, pacing back and forth, like it was waiting for the perfect opportunity to pounce. 

Which was why the sudden squirm and struggle of the Hell puppy in Impi’s arms was so poorly timed. He was fighting with Impi to be let go. 

“Now isn’t the time for little dog syndrome!” Impi might have laughed, but it was a little tearful as she fought with the ball of fur to stay with her. “It will crush you!” She scolded suddenly; only to swallow her words. 

No more a ball of fur, but a man, the Hell puppy stood on two legs, rolling out each shoulder and cracking his neck like he was easing the tension of being cramped into such a small body. 

The Gargoyle flinched at the sight of the man. Stranger still, it lowered its front legs and head almost like it was bowing to the man before it. 

The man seemed not to notice when he planted his hands on his lower back and bent on them, his spine making the most unsettling noises. 

“Aaaaah! That feels good!” The man exclaimed like he was in some form of ecstasy. “So, so good!” 

Jolting when the man spoke, Impi’s complete confusion did not end but only delved deeper when the sound of the man’s voice created an odd euphoric moment in her body.

Almost like by his words alone, Impi was on the brink of an orgasm.

Impi squirmed, trying to shake off the sensation. Forgetting that only a second or more ago she was at risk of being attacked by a Gargoyle, or that her Hell puppy was now a man with a voice that could touch upon her body and soul carnally.

“Yeet!” The man shouted, swinging into a kick with a burst of wild laughter.

Forced to cover her face with both arms and into a cower when the Gargoyle blew a hole in the wall when the man kicked it, Impi felt the small scrapes and scratches of broken brick and wood splinters when they exploded into discord through the room.

“You have been among the humans too long.” Another man spoke once the boom of the gargoyle’s forceful extraction from the room subsided. “Brother.”

Confused, Impi stayed small and curled up, one hand instinctively on her stomach when the two men - who were definitely only one before - started arguing in a foreign language.

After a few seconds, and sure they seemed to have forgotten that Impi was even there, she lifted her head carefully to look.

The man who kicked the gargoyle stood in the middle of the room, arms wide and full of nonchalant attitude for the man he was arguing with sitting atop a bookshelf.

Exactly where the owl had been sitting. 

There was no more a magnificent black owl, but a man grasping his shoulder and complaining to the other man for being among the mortal world too long. 

It stopped when the man who was standing suddenly snapped: “Yadda yadda yadda!” With his hands mimicking talking mouths. “Look, our little hell queen is alive, isn’t she?” He shrugged, lowering his hands to rest on his waist. 

“THAT WAS NO—ok. Fine.” The man on the shelves started to shout but seemed to reign in his temper at the last moment. “This isn’t a complete waste of time. We have our Satan baby maker.” He hopped down from the shelf; expelling a breath when he landed.

Impi tried to shrink further back into tent shadows at a loss for what was happening but stopped when the faint snuffle and panting breaths that became familiar since Abbot gifted her the Hell puppy filled the room.

Hands falling from Impi’s face when the Hell puppy turned into the much wider doorway, she blinked back at its inky eyed stare.

Was Impi tricked?

It wasn’t impossible.

The two men seemed to freeze up when staring at the Hell puppy. The first grabbing the wounded arm of the second and jumping back with a hissed: “Shit! Shit! Shit!” Like he was facing the most ferocious beast ever created.

It was a tiny ball of fur that couldn’t walk and only waddled before it was too tuckered out and fell over.

Impi almost laughed.

Almost.

No longer looking at a ball of fur with inky black eyes, Impi swallowed a scream.

The Hell Puppy was no puppy when its body grew, and it sprouted not one, but three salivating, snarling heads.

Filling the space created by the gargoyle with ease, the three heads snapped its jaws. The storm grey of its fur rippling like swirling water under the black moon, all six eyes of inky black murderous in their focus.

The tenor of each heads growl not a warning, but a promise it would bite.

“Told you it was Cerberus!” The first man shouted, slapping the other man on the shoulder overexcited whilst trying to back further into the room.

Cerberus?

Impi scrambled like the two men deeper into the room to get as far from the three-headed demon hound as possible. 

Abbot must have lost his mind to give Impi such a thing that she could never hope to control.

“Grab the baby maker!” The first man hissed to the other. “I will give this overgrown genetic mishap a bonio!” He laughed for some reason when he said it, and like he held renewed vigour, bounced off towards Cerberus with both arms open.

Stunned, about ready to tell the man to come back, Impi barely made a sound before a hand covered her mouth and she was reeled tightly to a firm and strong chest.

“Sorry!” The man whispered. “I promise we won’t bite.” He chuckled, and with that, Impi felt the world ripple and fade into a darkness deeper than Hell’s.


	10. Fall to Stand

* * *

Watching the clock tick over to 4 am, Impi witnessed the two men who - now there was light - were most definitely related deflate from their tense states with huge sighs and beaming smiles. 

The man who pretended to be the wounded owl clapped his hands together, rubbing them as he said: “Humans one. Horned mother fucker nil!” With a burst of handsome laughter, that matched his youthful, heart breaker eyes. 

The first man clapped and whooped also. Until a worker at the counter of the McDonald’s, they were sitting in told him to keep the noise down. 

“Oops! Sorry!” He called back in a whispering shout, though he never lost the prideful smile when he laid both hands on his brother's shoulders. Shaking him about with his excitement. “We did it, Peter! We did it!” He sang in his brother's ear.

Told shortly after coming to in the carpark of the roadside McDonald’s not to cause a scene or play up in the friendliest - almost pleading - way by the man who the other called Peter, there was a part of Impi that knew she couldn’t exactly create a scene. 

Who would Impi go back to if she told a soul that she was kidnapped from Hell? 

Other than a certified trip to a psych ward, there was no one on earth who Impi could ask for help. 

Knowing that Impi was alone with the two seemingly hapless and - possibly - harmless men, Impi sipped at the watered-down coke they bought her and considered opening the toy still inside the box of the Happy Meal they bought her. 

Stuck in the mortal world with no idea how to return to Hell or even make contact, Impi decided for the time being it was better to behave and not create a reason for her kidnappers to need to use force or worse on her. 

The younger one - by no more than a year at most - shovelled chips drowned in bbq sauce into his mouth while, Peter tapped on a phone, messaging someone. 

They did not look like Demons, or Angels, or one of the Fallen. Which left Impi curious to whom or what they belonged to. 

Peter remarked that his brother had been among the humans too long, but they called their victory a tally for humans. 

Confused as to what they were, Impi knew by their shape-shifting it was not totally human. 

“I told dad the feathered fucks would orchestrate an attack during the witching hour.” The one who was eating an unhealthy amount of chips slurped it all down with his large coke to speak. “It’s the only time the gates to Hell are weak enough for them to ram through them.” He sat up straighter, pouring out with pride for his own clever deduction. 

At the mention of the witching hour, it made better sense why the men were so tense until the clock turned 4 am. 

Albeit, Impi never knew that it meant the Angels could attempt a direct invasion of Hell due to its gates being weakened. 

Peter eyed his brother dubiously and shook his head. “You overheard their plans as I did.” He put down the mobile on the table. “Don’t pretend you actually found a brain cell.” He smiled at his brother, sarcastic and sweet. 

The younger man gaped back at his brother, before slapping him across the back of the head and demanding: “Take that back!” Whilst pointing the bitten end of his straw into his brothers face. 

Far from dastardly and horrible like Impi thought they would be, there was an innocent and boyish charm to both men. 

Their closeness as brothers apparent by how they fought and teased and mocked each other. 

A complete sense of carelessness was within the youngest for his death charge at Cerberus before Impi passed out. 

Half expecting to find the man didn’t make it or was at least sporting a serious and life-threatening wound, Impi blinked surprise when she came around to find him in perfect health. 

Running out of the watered-down coke, Impi set down the empty cup. The ice rattling around the bottom it drew her kidnappers out of their sibling-like arguing. 

“I imagine you have questions?” Peter asked, using the heel of his hand to shove his brother off the edge of their table practically. “About why we have taken you and all that?” 

Jumping up in the chair, Impi didn’t think they would be forthcoming about their motives. It seemed that way of thinking was wrong. Wary to know if another faction who wished Impi dead or to come to their side, left her reluctant to speak. 

“We aren’t affiliated to anyone.” The second man spoke in place of any questions being asked, shoving away his brother's hand to slide back across the table, leaning over and coming too close to Impi to hush: “We simply want to offer you a chance to get out of this mess.” In a sympathetic tone. 

Impi stared back at the brothers, a hand touching her still flat stomach. Impi might not have known much about many things, but she understood well what they were suggesting to her. 

“I...” Impi started to speak but rapidly became quiet when her head again became light and airy. Like it would float away, and it was not attached to her body. 

From behind her ear, Impi could feel the breath of another. It was cold. Familiar. A sense of grounding and calmness though it should have been the furthest thing from. 

“They’re offering a lucrative deal.” It was the man; Impi met in purgatory again. Invading her mind to speak directly to her. “A chance to terminate the spawn you’re carrying and end your ordeal as the Herald barer.” He spoke matter of fact, cold and clipped. “A chance to return to your mortal life. All memories of your life with Luce erased.” He added, making it sound much more lucrative. 

Shocked into a stillness of mind and body at what was being offered, Impi found herself enticed a little. 

Being burdened with the fate of mankind was not a light one. To know that everything Impi knew and loved about the world depended on who she would side with if she birthed the child she was carrying was quite the toll to pay. 

Impi broke from her frozen state when something brushed her shoulder and neck. There was no one behind, and it took for the whisper of the man in her ear to clarify that he was somehow able to touch her from where he was in purgatory. 

It was like having a phantom that could come and go as it pleased, but who knew precisely what Impi needed at that moment it was present. 

There was a comfort in the ghost-like touching that let Impi relax. 

“You were given no choice in this fate that Luce placed in your hands.” The Fallen sighed mournfully. “At least with this offer, you will. You will have dominion over your life again.” He purred, making the deal sound so much sweeter. 

It was lucrative—the idea to have control again over her life and what she could do with it. 

Impi always wanted to be a mother. To have a family of her own after never knowing the love of one growing up. It was a yearning that many times had led Impi into the arms of all the wrong men. Men who promised the world and who only brought pain and fear. Over and over again. 

A desperation to be loved, even if only minimally found Impi in toxic relationships for so many years that by the time Abbot showed up, Impi was exhausted and worn down. 

Abbot might have been the Devil, but he was the kindest and most sincere lover Impi ever had. 

There were ulterior motives behind Abbot starting a relationship with Impi, but he was still everything she had looked for in a man and more. 

The only catch truly was that the child Impi was carrying was to be the one who brought the end to an ancient war. Impi too would hold a pivotal role. 

Did Impi want that looming over her head for the sake of finally finding a place where she was wanted, loved, and needed? 

Was her motivation selfishly driven? 

Was Impi’s fear of never being loved and abandoned by the men in her life really that strong that she would willingly hold their fate in her hands? 

Did Abbot even love her? 

“It is the one thing that The Morning Star is truly not capable of.” The Fallen mourned into Impi’s ear. “Love.” 

Snapping a hand up, as if to swat him away from whispering in her ear, Impi’s eyes scrunched closed when the lightness of her head stopped suddenly; leaving her faint and sick. 

Needing to grip the table edge to ground herself, Impi bowed forward a little to stop from falling off the back of the stool she was sitting on. 

Left in conflict over what was offered and then whispered, Impi laid her head on the table. Drawing in slow breaths to try and settle her heart and mind. 

Slowly the sounds of the place they were sitting came back. The hum of machines. The sizzling of meat being cooked. The laughter of the staff behind the counter and in the kitchen. The snuffling and snorting of the Hell Puppy as it licked her leg. 

The Hell Puppy? 

Refusing to sit up in case she slipped out the chair, Impi cracked open one eye and looked down. 

Between a pair of polished black shoes, the Hell Puppy flopped on its side again. Tuckered out once more from its waddling. 

The linoleum floor stained by food and shoe prints was still in place as was the table. The two men were no longer sitting at it by the lack of their legs beneath the table. 

Brow furrowing deep, Impi let her eyes travel up and away from the Hell puppy and up the legs of the man it was rolled on its side between. 

Sitting up slowly as it became impossible to look upon the man completely without being upright, Impi pressed into the warmth of the hand when it was offered. 

Settling into the strange safeness and comfort Abbot offered when he lowered into a crouch beside the table. When Abbot came down, and Impi could finally look upon his face, Impi closed her eyes again. 

Abbot seemed to hold a habit of showing up in ten seconds before Impi was swayed away from him. 

It was starting to feel that unless he was close by, Impi was susceptible to others' influence. 

Was it that they were powerful entities that could make Impi question what she thought she wanted and knew with certainty? 

Was the influence over her thinking a by-product of Abbot? 

That being in close quarters to Abbot let Impi believe that she wanted to be with him? To carry his child? 

It was a terribly confusing state of mind and conflict to be in. To not know what was wanted by her own mind and what was influenced by others' machinations. 

Even with not knowing which it was, Impi found a home and place she longed to be in Abbot’s arms. 

There was nothing complicated about being wrapped up in the strong and sure embrace of Abbot’s arms, and Impi knew that it was her who believed it when she slipped off the stool and into his waiting chest. 

Burying her face in the crook of Abbot’s neck, Impi smiled when he drew her closer and sighed, aggravated: “It would seem I need to keep a closer eye on you.” Whilst standing, letting Impi curl herself around him to hold on. 

Staying in place, Impi smiled when her Hell Puppy yapped around Abbot’s ankles, snorting in some indignation at being made to walk until Abbot grumbled and bent down, scooping him up. 

Coming out of Abbot’s neck when the snorting ball of fur was dropped in the curve of her body, Impi smiled at the inky eyes when it waddled up to her chest, forcing her to turn away when it licked her face over and over. 

It was hard to believe the lazy, hapless ball of fur could become the ferocious mythological beast, Cerberus. 

“Abbot?” Barely speaking, Impi pushed away the Hell puppy to settle him in the curve or her body, petting his head until he started vibrating with his content and low growls. “I was offered a way to terminate.” She spoke carefully of what the set of brothers gave their reason for taking her was. 

Abbot had been walking but stopped when Impi mentioned the termination. A rapid increase in his body temperature leaving him almost burning to touch, it was cooled only by the abrupt explosion of his wings spreading from his shoulders. 

Being so open with his anger display, the woman who previously shouted at the brother left unnamed to be quiet, shrieked and shrilled. 

Abbot seemed to pay the woman or that they were in the mortal world no mind when he almost threw Impi off him to stand, his hand almost like a claw over her stomach when he felt it and demanded: “Did you eat or drink anything they offered?!” 

Stunned, stupefied almost by the pure rage in Abbot’s voice, how again his eyes bled to black, Impi gripped the Hell puppy a little too tight that he nipped her fingers to be let go. 

Impi had drunk the coke. 

Slowly, stiffly, Impi nodded. 

The answer made Abbot’s wings flap and ruffle. A visual of his agitation and anger. 

“You stupid—-!” Abbot started to shout, the clawing of his hand over Impi’s stomach becoming more pinching in its search like he was trying to find or pick up a sign that the baby was still there. 

Did Impi go through with the offer made without knowing? 

Impi felt no different. There was no change or pain or anything to indicate otherwise. 

Abbot’s palm pushed firmly on her stomach. In an almost whimper, his face softened, the agitated fluttering of his wings softening and becoming still as he drew them in and around Impi, bringing her closer until he was able to lay his head on Impi’s. 

Left with a sickness over the idea that Impi had gone through with the termination without knowing, Impi gulped for air when Abbot took her hand and laid it where his settled. 

“The baby is fine.” Abbot heaved heavily, letting his eyes close. “They’re safe.” He assured, releasing his hand's pressure, laying it over Impi’s where he placed it on her stomach. 

The calm relief lasted only a second before Abbot gripped Impi’s face between his fingers, angling her to look up at him. 

“Stop with these doubts over my intentions.” Abbot was speaking both in frustration and anger. “They will tell you what you need to hear to gain your attention. They will feed on your doubts over my weakness for you.” He lectured. “You are my greatest weakness right now. My Achilles heel and they know it.” He almost growled. “They know that to keep you safe; I will move with reckless abandon if it means no harm comes to you.” He stressed, his fingers becoming pinching where they held Impi’s face. “If I have to fall so you can stand, then so be it.”


	11. Waking the Beast

* * *

Standing beside the bed watching Abbot in his sleeping, Impi considered climbing back in. 

There was only one night in a year Abbot would sleep. So deep in rest to a state of comatose, Abbot would not wake for anything. 

Hell was on high alert when the night came that Abbot would rest. Watching over not only Abbot but the domain he created. 

Impi left without watching due to agreeing to sleep when Abbot did; there was no one to shake off or hide from when the voice came to her again in the depth of her dreaming. 

Since being taken from Hell and almost tricked into terminating, Impi grew warier and warier of the man who crept into her mind with the same ease of opening a window or door. 

From the morning Hell was invaded Abbot determined to keep a closer eye on Impi. Never far or long from Impi‘a side, it was noticeable that the entity within purgatory stayed away. No whispers behind the ear preying on her doubts and worries. 

That night the silence ended. Awoken within Purgatory again, Impi didn’t stay long enough to listen to the achingly handsome man speak. Pulling herself out without knowing how Impi woke with a start and a cold sweat. 

Leaving the bed when the sheets threaten to become damp from the extremity of the cold sweat she was steeped in, Impi remained standing beside the bed in both awe and shock. 

Only coming back to her senses after the Hell puppy shuffled out from under the sheets, turning inky eyes on her. 

Staying quiet and silent on all that was going on was no longer an option. Not when Impi could be slipped from one reality into another without possessing any way to stop it, Impi wanted Abbot to wake. 

To spill out everything that was going on. To speak every little detail that Impi at first was terrified to admit but now was burning on her tongue. 

Abbot was right in front of Impi, and still, she couldn’t speak a word. Not without promise, he would hear a single one. 

Regardless, everything started to spill out. Uttered in breathless whispers and pitching notes when tears threatened to drown her speech. Pouring out every doubt, every little thing that occurred whilst Impi was within Purgatory; it kept on coming and coming until the only reason she stopped was from being out of breath. 

Gasping for air after the rush of exhilaration for speaking took over, Impi clutched her chest and sunk into a tight crouch beside the bed. Hugging her legs close to her chest. Not wanting to see or even know if any of it disturbed Abbot’s slumber, or penetrated his comatose state, Impi buried her face in the crook of her arm. 

Tired again from the mental and emotional explosion of months and months worth of silence and inner turmoil, Impi refused to let her eyes close when they ached from staring into the darkness of her arms. 

Groaning from the bed, making it known that Abbot was awake and no longer at rest further chased away the idea of sleep. 

Remaining small and huddled beside the bed, Impi could feel the tempo in her chest increase with every padding step that crossed the stone floor. Coming around the bed with it was the blistering hot aura that bled off Abbot. 

Undeniably angered that Impi could smell the start of smoke and smouldering of cloth catching the light, a shallow gasp of air was taken. 

The ruffling of feathers came seconds before the bellowing of air that knocked Impi off her feet, forcing her to look finally. 

The sudden fanning of air let the heat bleeding off Abbot take, and the sheets burst into a brilliant fire of blackened flames. 

Wings spread, caring not for the walls' restrictions, the strength in them far greater than stone, fissures spread throughout where Abbot’s wings pushed. 

No longer reminded of a night sky when seeing them, Impi could see nothing but a sheer, abyss like darkness in them. 

It matched the darkness of Abbot’s eyes, how contorted and twisted by rage his mouth became. 

For the first time since Impi was told who - rather what - Abbot was, she was fearful. 

Cowering was not even a choice when Impi was petrified to move, let alone speak when Abbot took a step closer. 

Not even that the bed was on fire - but strangely not burning - took Abbot’s attention from Impi as he came down on one knee so rapidly that the imprint of his image was left where he had been standing. 

It suffocated the air from the room. The almost clawing of Abbot’s wings as they enclosed around Impi and forced her across the floor until her face was in the pinch of his fingers, painful. 

No longer like silk but barbed to the touch, Impi flinched from them only once. In the ironclad grip of Abbot’s fingers, nose to nose with him, Impi‘s chest stuttered, and her stomach clenched. 

“Who was it?” Abbot demanded. Unable to speak above a hiss from how fiercely his jaw was clenched. “Who!” Came out in a shout so great, it shocked Impi‘s heart to a stop. 

Jarred by the absence of a beat in her chest, Impi was left faint. Struggling to return the rhythm of her heart, Impi was left in the sense of departure. 

The room already painted black it went a shade deeper the longer the silence in her chest continued. 

No longer sure if Impi was even sitting up or laid down, whether Abbot was angry or desperate by how distant he grew, a hand started to reach only when the darkness became a falling; like the world was tumbling, or maybe Impi was? 

Sent into a state of head-spinning that Impi never knew was even possible, it came to an end far quicker than it started. 

Back hitting something warm and soft, Impi‘s heart close to screamed when it found itself beating again. Rushed and jittery, it was an oddness to be so aware of it. 

Breathing ragged and out of sync, Impi blinked over and over to chase away the shadows in the corners of her eyes, making room for the milky iridescence of the sky above to be seen unobstructed.

Arms spread wide; Impi let her fingers dig and bury into the sand she was laying on. Let the rapids of blood leave her ears to listen to the sea break on the shore.

Was she asleep again?

Sure as the breaths she was taking that she was back in purgatory, Impi reconsidered sitting upright whilst her body and head were still not caught up with one another.

Truthfully, Impi didn’t even feel like she was within her body. It felt too light and airy and without solid form.

“Well, well...,” a man chuckled pleasantly, from somewhere behind and Impi knew that it was the mystery man she always met when entering purgatory. “The Devil has truly outdone himself.”

Impi licked her lips. They felt dry and flaky. Sore.

“Am I dead?” Impi croaked, aware how dry and parched her throat was, but despite it, she forced out the question.

“Not quite.” The man came to stand over Impi, his somehow benign presence a mismatch to the malignant way in which he looked gleefully upon her. “You’re somewhere in between.”


	12. Between

* * *

“What does that mean?!” Impi cried. 

Flying up from the sands with such rapidness that the entity still without name retreated in a burst of shock. He laughed it off, though it jittered. 

“Easy tiger.” Masking that Impi gave him a fright with a suave smile, he knelt in the sands, the flutter of his off white wings rustling the soft grains. “Have you forgot what I told you already?” He cocked his head, mocking Impi almost. 

“You have been filling my head with all sorts.” Impi whimpered back, fed up to the point of complete break down of the taunting, mind games everyone around her was playing. 

The man groaned like he was fed up himself, pushing a hand back through his dark hair. “Don’t get all weepy on me, moth.” He chastised. “You’re not dead. Only in a very, very deep sleep.” He explained like it made it sound better than potentially being dead. 

“A coma?” Came out dumbly from Impi’s mouth as she sought to understand what she was being told. 

So it came to a shock when he beamed back. “Exactly that.” His arms spreading wide. “Your body is in Hell, but your soul is here.” Came with a nod of his head. “A temporary separation.” Added as his arms crossed to rest on his knee, leaning closer to Impi’s face. “It took longer than expected for my little concoction to work.” He frowned, appearing disappointed. 

Impi was still trying to make peace with the idea she was separated from her body. How angry Abbot became when she told him everything. How it led to her waking in Purgatory. 

Until she fully listened to what she was told. 

“What concoction?” She couldn’t recall taking anything recently. 

He smiled, releasing a hand from the fold of his arms to tap his nose. “Oh. The one I managed to convince your horned lover was a way to rid you of the spawn you’re carrying.” 

The coke? 

Impi for a spell stared off into the iridescent distance, only to turn back to the man when she cottoned on to what he was speaking about. 

“Mhm.” He nodded proudly. “The measurements of some things were clearly off. Though it worked.” He clapped his hands together, pointing the fingers at her. 

“Don’t worry about that whole thing of telling him everything. It was nothing but an illusion to create the level of fear in you to stop your heart long enough that I could snag your soul.” Came out in a cheery, somehow innocent tittering. 

Impi gawked back. Angry but more so at being fooled; again. 

“Why?” Crept off her tongue. “Why go so far to bring me here when you had no problems before?” It made little sense to Impi why he needed such an extreme method to bring her to Purgatory. 

His wings ruffled. Similar to how Abbot would his when annoyed. 

“Cerberus.” He stated bitterly. “That three-headed mutt has been watching over you closer than you think.” He stood, offering Impi a hand. “That all aside, let us talk.” His smile was again somehow malignant, yet, benign. “I think it is about time we met more formally.” A twinkle lit up his eyes. “Though I am not opposed to finishing what we started.” He winked. 

Starting to accept the hand up, Impi paused at the suggestive turn in the conversation. 

Curious to know the identity of the man who plagued her, there was no want to become entwined with him. 

“As you wish.” The hand was taken away, settled in the pockets of the off white trousers that almost matched his wings, he kept his torso bare. By his back turning, Impi caught sight of the thick black markings covering almost every inch of his skin. 

It was more a startled shout. It rushed out with the shock of seeing another man baring them that she lost her decorum. 

He stopped. Glimpsing over his shoulder. A slow smile taking shape, he mused: “Do I look more familiar now?” 

There was an eerie familiarity with the man’s face. In his eyes. The way he smiled. 

“Michael.” Uttered on a breath, Impi looked again at the markings on his back. They were the brother markings of those on Abbot’s back. “You're his brother.” Figuring it out, Impi was left in a stupor. 

“Mmmm.” He hummed. “That is my name.” Facing Impi again with a sly smile, he raised on the shoulder, appearing cockier than any time before. “I prefer the name I chose for myself.” He placed a hand to his chest, his eyes losing their dark tone and becoming a greyer blue. “Benjamin.” Giving his preferred name with a theatrical bow. 

Staying in the bow, Benjamin flicked his eyes upon Impi “You can call me, Benji.” 

Losing all rational thinking when Benjamin finally revealed who he was, Impi’s prior guilt turned more sickly. 

Impi knew she could never, ever let Abbot know about it. Not with knowing how deeply he resented his brother. 

“What is an Arch Angel doing in Purgatory?” Impi withdrew a step, warier than before with knowing who the man was. 

The meeting with the Angel still fresh and raw in her memory; she covered her stomach. Sheltering it as best she could manage. 

Benjamin scowled at the rapid retreat, the wariness that took the place of the previous sense of calm. 

“It’s quiet.” Benjamin looked around. “The only place my little brother truly can not enter.” He explained. “A safe place.” Rubbing his temple with a smile. “For you.” 

Making it sound like all that was being done was for Impi’s benefit, Benjamin came back a step. Testing almost how close Impi would let him get. 

After the near-death she met at the hands of a deranged Angel, Impi backed away immediately. 

Benjamin put up his hands, showing Impi the palms as he moved away. “Alright.” He chuckled. “Gabriel certainly shook you up.” 

“That was Gabriel?!” Impi squeaked. The supposed messenger of God was the very Angel who attacked Impi with a Holy Relic? 

Benjamin gripped his chin. “Gabbi has always been overzealous.” Making it sound less than what it was, a great smile made him appear more youthful. “A little more inclined to kill those who fall away from Father’s design.” Shrugging over it, like it was more a funny quirk of personality, Benjamin let go of his chin. 

Staring. Utterly dumbfounded. A shake of the head broke Impi from her shock, and she uttered quietly: “You’re all bonkers.” 

Benjamin lifted his face with a little: “Hm? What was that?” 

Knowing that the fate of humanity, of Heaven and Hell, laid within Impi and with her choice, she was starting to feel like she could make the decision when the time came. At least, who she would show no favour. 

If those she met were the representatives of what was supposed to be good, she wanted no part in their machinations. 

“Will you base your opinion on many by the actions of few?” Benjamin queried, showing some grief over the concept. “Let evil reign all because of one?” 

Never being presented with a question like it, Impi knew she should have spent some time and consideration on it. 

So when: “At least evil knows itself.” Came out before she even truly absorbed the gravity of what she was asked, Impi shocked herself. 

“Does it?” Benjamin was rapid to respond. “Does it know what it is?” His wings spread out. They were as great and breathtaking as Abbot’s. They shared stars shooting through the silk of each one. A perfect depiction of the contrast of day and night. “Could you look evil in the eye and know it down to its core?” He demanded whilst laughing like Impi said the most ridiculous thing he ever heard.

Again Impi didn’t think before she let her emotions speak over her mind. 

“I have looked evil in the eye for the past year. I know it better than you ever could.” 

A furious clanging started after Impi closed her mouth. Metal running over metal so fast it created sparking, Impi felt as if something was yanking at her core. From a place deep inside her. Forcing her back. 

Benjamin’s wings curled down, shuffling about in renewed irritation. 

“He’s calling.” Benjamin lifted a hand. “Go on.” His fingers flicked like he was telling her to go. A strange smile on his face as he did. 

Stumbling back when the pulling became more like she was being ripped backwards, Impi couldn’t stop it. Neither did she want to. 

One final, aggressive clawing, Impi lost her footing, but she wasn’t falling, she was being dragged upwards.

Eyes closing when the disorientation became too much, Impi hit hard on something. 

Chest on fire, like she hadn’t breathed in hours, Impi’s mouth ripped open as she desperately drew in the air; all she tasted was dust and sand. 

Coughing and spluttering like she was drowning in dust and sand, the contradictions between the two senses of choking but not breathing for hours left Impi in complete disarray. 

“Breathe,” Abbot told Impi. “Breathe.” He repeated. Agitation and anger rolling on his tongue. “Slowly.” 

Trying to figure out how to do as Abbot asked when her body was in total confusion and conflict, Impi tried to open her eyes, to move. 

She couldn’t. Stuck in place and incapable of doing anything beyond choke on every lungful she took, Impi only became deeper in her panic. 

“Calm down.” Abbot was irritated and with it concerned. “And breathe.” He repeated it, and the third time it seemed to sink in. 

Impi wasn’t breathing at all. 

Like a kickstart, Impi took a long but slow inhale. It was shuddery, weak, but she finally tasted air. 

Exhaling slowly and repeating until the burning in her chest was nothing but a slow simmering, Impi finally felt her body. It responded to how she wanted. 

Eyes cracking open, Impi blinked away their dryness, closing them again and scrunching them from how sore they became when touched by air. 

From head to toe, Impi was frozen to the bone. Shivering and teeth chattering, except for one spot on her body that was almost scorched by the heat upon it. 

Attempting a second time to open her eyes, Impi was met by the deep black of Abbot’s stare. The heat source from where he slid his hand between Impi’s head and the cold stone floor she was laying on. 

Abbot released the tension in his face with a deep breath, and with it came a sweeping of air. 

Still focused on breathing, Impi tucked into the immense heat of Abbot’s wing when it stretched over her, drawing her closer to him, to the safe cradle of his arms. 

“What am I getting so wrong that you are running from me?” Abbot demanded angrily, the tenor vibrating through Impi stronger than the quivering of the cold she was wrapped in before. 

Shocked by the insinuation more than how angered it came, Impi couldn’t answer Abbot. 

Not when the rattle and scrape of glass over stone took Impi’s attention. Fingers no longer clawed around the small bottle in her palm. Impi watched the slow rolling of a glass bottle. From its broken neck, a black droplet fell. 

Unable to recall ever seeing it, Impi didn’t need to know what was wrong with the situation. 

Suicide was a guaranteed entry into Purgatory. 

Benjamin told Impi that he needed to frighten her enough to stop her heart to drag her soul out. That the telling Abbot everything was a simple illusion cast by the coke that she drank before. 

The detail he left out was Impi needed to consume something else to keep her heart from starting again. 

Thinking it strange when she managed to pull herself out of purgatory before she started spouting everything on her mind to Abbot, a guess told Impi that she was given the bottle and sent back. 

There was a blank in her memory of when she drank from the insidious bottle. 

It left Abbot looking in the wrong direction. 

At Impi and her behaviour and the way, it could only be interpreted and not of the man who continued to drag her into Purgatory. 

“The baby?” Impi croaked out. Not knowing what she drank or how long she departed her body, Impi’s concern turned to what was more important at that moment.

Abbot’s feathers ruffled. Bristled. Becoming less comforting as they turned sharper at their edges.

It left Impi in fear of the next few words Abbot would speak.

With her pregnancy to be far longer than any humans, Impi was still in the early, often dangerous first trimester.

“Fine.” Abbot ground out. “They’re more resilient than your efforts to rid them from your body.”

Speared straight through the chest at the accusation that Impi tried to kill their unborn child, she stopped breathing again.

It was so far from the truth, but easy to see why Abbot would think it after what she said when she was taken from Hell only a few days before.

“That isn-I—?!” Lost how to respond to such an accusation, Impi stumbled on her words. The harsh brush of Abbot’s wing withdrawn when she was no longer facing freezing to death. He didn’t look at her when he stood, snatching the broken bottle as he did, it cracked under his fingers. The shards falling and tinkling over the stone floor.

“I don’t know why you’re testing the limits of my patience.” Abbot opened his hand. There was not even a scratch when he tipped the larger glass parts from his palm. “What it is that you’re trying to achieve with your actions.” Abbot curled his wings in tight to his back. “I have been nothing but generous with every intent to keep you happy, and still, that is not enough?” He pleaded almost. “How much more will you demand of me until you’re content?!” Abbot switched from pleading to angrily demand to know what it was Impi needed from him. “Tell me now and let it be done if you wish for this, us, our child to be no more.” He looked at Impi like she was completely alien to him. A woman he no longer recognised.

“I met Michael.” Impi forced herself to sit up. Ignoring the glass stabbing in her palms as she clawed the stones to bring herself off the floor. “I didn’t know it was him until tonight. He was the one I met when I woke in Purgatory.” She raised her bloody palms; they're stinging a blissful reminder that she was alive. “I didn’t do this consciously.” She cried out. “This was him.” She found herself angry, wildly furious, “I have no idea what I am doing. What I am facing.” Finally, she said it. “You dragged me into this with no warning beyond what you were and why you needed me.” Her voice rose an octave, hitting upon shrill. “You dragged me into this mess! So don’t turn this on me and make it my fault that I am everyone’s god damn puppet that they can use and manipulate as they wish.”

Hands sore and stinging, Impi met Abbot’s furious reaction with her own.

“I am human.” She spat. “We make mistakes. Bad choices and more, and we feel every single one.” She forgot her hand was embedded with glass when she set one on her chest; stabbing it.

“You have lied to me from the second we met. I forgave that. You used me to be the bearer of a child who is the harbinger of a war that will see everything I have ever known destroyed, without asking me, and I am selfish?” She emphasised her question. “I am testing YOUR patience?” She stressed, laughing suddenly, darkly, “You haven’t a concept what either is if you think I am selfishly pushing the limits of your patience.” Stumbling to her feet, Impi shook terribly, but she felt determined to stand on her own two feet.

The entire time Impi ranted, laid out everything that led to the moment they were in, Abbot chose a terrible silence. Holding his wings close to his back, his hands almost in a state of petrifaction at his sides, his eyes cold and astute. As always.

Tired, weary and worn down by the most recent event, Impi wasn’t sure any more if she could endure another eleven months until her child was born, being treated like some toy to be played without consideration that anything could break.

“I thought I could do this.” Impi sounded as she felt. Defeated. “But I can’t.” She shook her head, shrugging, apathetic. “I want to go home. To be left alone.” She admitted.

Her life was far from a happy one before Abbot. But it was safer. Less chaotic and life-threatening.

She wanted it back, even if it cost her Abbot. Their baby.

Maybe it was hormones or stress, but Impi was exhausted. She wanted a sense of calm and quiet and unassuming again.

Abbot took Impi’s face tenderly in one hand, her bleeding hands in his other.

“Stay.” Abbot kissed her forehead. “Don’t leave me. Please?” He again was pleading, and the idea that the Devil himself was begging was so ludicrous that Impi found it impossible to think it was more than a ploy. An attempt to soften Impi and coerce her to his bidding.

“No.” Slipped out much like how Impi told Benjamin she saw evil for what it was. “I want to go home.” Closing her eyes so she could not see Abbot’s face, she took a step away. “I don’t want this anymore.” She conveyed as strongly as she could.

A gust of wind blew. Strong enough that Impi tumbled over from it. Hitting hardwood.

“Whoopsie daisy.” Someone laughed. 

Impi’s eyes opened with a start—the hiss of the coffee machine above warning that the steamer was running too long.

Shaking off the surprise of slipping over. In front of a customer of all things. Impi jumped back up and scrambled to switch the machine off—a soft wince coming when the knob stabbed at her palms.

“Sorry!” Impi tried to laugh off her embarrassment. “I will start a fresh one.” Assuring the young man who was grinning softly that she would start afresh order, Impi wiped her hands on the apron tied at her waist.

Head a little fuzzy. Like Impi woke from the longest sleep, Impi couldn’t shake the idea that she forgot something important.

In a short daze, as she went through the motions of making a coffee, Impi smiled pleasantly when she finally produced the order for the waiting man.

Taking the note and ringing the cost through the till Impi answered: “Yes!” Far too quickly and enthusiastically when he enquired if she was single that she flushed terribly, dropping his change on the floor when he laughed.

Bending down to pick up the dropped coins, Impi took a moment to settle herself and hide behind her hands.

It was painful how quickly Impi jumped on the idea of being with someone, even when she knew by her track record that she picked poorly when it came to men.

“You, uh? Got lost?” The man waiting for his change leaned over the counter, and Impi lost the small composure she gained back when she peered up and with a stressed smile came back up. Sliding the change on the counter to avoid another embarrassing reaction.

He was handsome certainly, but that didn’t mean he was kind. Hair a blond-brown and in soft waves that were almost curled, his grin was infectious.

“Andy.” He offered his hand to shake.

Impi took it gently, smiling when she felt a slip of paper pushed against her palm. “Impi.” She gave her name too.

Andy took back his hand, being sure that Impi had the piece of paper. “Pretty name for a beautiful face.” He winked, picking up the coffee he ordered. Walking back to the door of the coffee shop, Andy didn’t break eye contact once.

It was a little unnerving as it was impressive that he didn’t fall over a single table or chair. Impi kind of hoped he would. To make even for her embarrassing enthusiasm over being single.

Andy left without tripping, and it left Impi with a sinking feeling. The sudden loneliness far more consuming than she expected, she shook herself.

Though she couldn’t shake off the feeling that she forgot something.

“You’re going crazy!” Impi laughed to herself. 

Finding something to clean and occupy her mind, she stopped when a single feather floated from the ceiling; from nowhere truly.

Blacker than night, Impi let it fall into her palm. 

It was soft like silk. And for a reason unknown, Impi’s heart skipped; excited about the presence of the feather without knowing why. 

A sudden vibration in the back pocket of her jeans, Impi dropped the feather, taking out her phone. 

Staring at the screen. At the text. The complete confusion of why she told Andy she was single when she wasn’t, Impi didn’t smile when she unlocked her phone and opened the message. 

Ludwig was reason enough to wish she was single. Thinking and wanting for so long to end their relationship, Impi could never bring herself to do it. 

Always excusing the terrible things that were more common and frequent than the good, Impi knew it was pathetic to stay only to feel like she was wanted.

Letting Ludwig know what time she finished work she slid her phone back in her pocket, picking up a cloth and spray to wipe down the tables.

The slip of paper Andy gave Impi thrown in the bin without looking; she knew it would be a hopeless venture to even think about being the one to stray for a change. 

Sighing sadly, Impi tried not to give the hell her life was too much thought as she cleared tables. 


	13. Clarity

* * *

Impi didn’t know why she acted shocked or hurt to discover Ludwig in bed with another woman. The clawing gut feeling was never new or wrong when Impi slipped the key in the front door only to bare witness after a few steps to what she knew she would. 

Turning around and leaving was a first for Impi. Taking a handle on her crumbling self-esteem and worth for the first time in twenty years, Impi actually left.

Everything. 

Clothes. Shoes. The little keepsakes that were her only constant when she was moved from one foster home to another. 

Impi was never wanted more than a few weeks or months as a child, so there was no surprise it was the same in her teens and now adulthood. 

Since the small slip at work and the unshakeable sense that she forgot something, how rapidly she jumped and told the man at the counter, she was single; everything felt off. 

Wrong in some way. 

Even now, whilst Impi sat at a bar staring at the ordered drink, something was wrong with the situation.

Like a voice was whispering in the back of her mind to tell her that she couldn’t drink?

It was strong enough that Impi was stuck staring at the slowly melting ice in the whiskey and coke.

Gripped by a gut-wrenching sense that Impi didn’t want the drink, that she didn’t want to be there, in that place, or really there at all, she tried to shake it off. 

It wasn’t like Impi wanted to be gone from the earth in a literal sense, but a figurative. To exist. Just not here. 

Sweeping aside the drink, Impi ignored the phone when it lit up again. 

Ludwig was calling, but Impi refused to answer. 

Watching it vibrate and shiver across the bar top, Impi couldn’t fathom where the sudden strength to walk away let alone leave Ludwig to go to voicemail came from. 

There was nothing different. Impi looked no different in her neon-lit reflection in the mirror on the back bar. 

Something felt different, though. A change that was taking place within her. A sense that she belonged somewhere, to someone, but it was slipping away. The chance to grasp it again was slowly moving further and further away, and Impi didn’t even know what it was. 

Plagued by some amnesia of what it was, Impi tried to sit and think about it. Push away the fog and mist that coated and disguised it. 

Whatever it was, Impi wasn’t permitted long to try and find it. 

Not when a cold unrelated to winter took ahold of the bar. 

Staring at the glass as it hissed and cracked by the thick, opaque ice that consumed it, the bar, Impi’s phone, the voice that whispered and told her not to drink, started to scream for her to run. 

Transfixed by the unnatural behaviour of the ice, Impi couldn’t move. 

The hum and din of the bar stopped dead. A sudden vacancy of sound leaving a ringing in her ears, Impi only broke out her staring due to the movement in the mirror behind the bar. 

What she saw injected Impi with a rush that set her feet on the floor. The stool knocked over in her rush. It cracked the icy tendrils that stretched like rose vines from the feet of the otherworldly being. 

Staring upon the magnificent spread of the dove white wings that stretched wall to wall from the man’s shoulders, Impi’s scream was stolen by the bite of cold that also took her breath when it snuck inside her lungs.

Like she was being turned to ice from the inside out, Impi could only watch as the winged man cawed the most malicious, malignant laugh she ever heard. He was beside himself. Tears streaming in the almost euphoric way he laughed. 

“My my my...Michael’s plan for once was a success.” The man cajoled Impi. “Why he chose such a feeble woman to be the bearer of his herald is beyond me.” He held his stomach as his speaking through his laughing left him out of breath; wheezing.

Close to petrified, Impi could only stare at the man who appeared like an Angel in some warped way. 

Body stabbed and burning from the cold traversing it from within, Impi’s tears turned to ice when they rolled down her cheeks from the constant staring she was forced into.

Not even her lips could break from the grip of the otherworldly cold. 

Filled once more with the sense that her demise was imminent. That she was met with a situation like this before, with the very same man, or Angel, Impi didn’t understand why her heart found the promise of safety when, once again, a single blacker than night feather fell before her eyes.

Turning slowly and carried on a far hotter breeze than the one the man brought, the feather danced upon it. 

There was no delicateness in how it moved; there was a sense of foreboding; danger. 

A danger that came in the shape of a clawed hand through the chest of the deliriously laughing Angel. 

Stuck with a horrifying front row seat to the macabre nature the Angel like being was forced into silence, Impi left her state of petrification from the ice only to step into it again with genuine fear. 

In the man's shadow and the magnificent wings another man stood, and his wings stretched further, higher; maliciously darker. 

The drip of the blood from the heart in the clawing of the second man’s hand hissed and bubbled when it touched his skin, but he kept ahold of it even when his skin started to blister and smoke. Crushing the limply thumping muscle, piercing into it with his fingers; turning it black. 

“I have played fair and nice with you for too long, Gabriel.” The second man mused like he was not holding the man he spoke to’s heart. “You can only blame yourself for this severe misstep.” He chastised, dropping the bubbling blackened mass of muscle, making the withdrawal of his hand slow and almost intentionally rough. 

Blood pooled in the man he called Gabriel’s mouth. Falling in rivers down his paled lips, his wings shuddering and recoiling around his body suddenly; it forced the second man to retreat with a leap and to bring his own wings around him. 

The hurricane-like winds both wings created bowled Impi off her feet, sending her body into a spin and flipped over the bar top. 

Landing with a crash among empty bottles and lemon slices and spilt beers, Impi had her breath knocked back into her by the shock in an odd way. 

Losing the sensation of being frozen, Impi forgot her shock to be hit by a rush of adrenaline. 

It was enough to get Impi back on her feet. For a split second. 

Forced to duck back down when something flew at the bar and promised to crash into her if she didn’t move, Impi threw herself down and her arms over her head. 

The shatter of the mirror came with the raining of glass that stabbed her arms and shoulders. 

The crack of a falling stool hitting across her legs, Impi curled when her legs throbbed. 

A furore thunderously underway within the bar left the entire place trembling, dust and brick and wood breaking and bursting like grenades set off.

Whatever the two men were, it was certainly not human. Their clamour alone was a testament to their being powerful entities, and that one was still standing after his heart was ripped out was inhuman. 

With no exit from behind the bar, Impi stayed as still and quiet as she could. Praying with no belief to God in the hope they would forget she was there and leave the bar standing so she could leave with her life. 

So it came as a shock when something soft and warm started to nuzzle and snort as it pushed at her hand. 

Jumping away from the needy like the way the thing tried to gain attention, Impi dared to open her eyes and look.

Met with a tiny grey ball of fur with two inky eyes, Impi gawked at it when a small pink tongue flopped out from the fur without a sign of a mouth. Then it flopped over on its side. Wheezing like it was tuckered out.

Given a horizontal view of the strange dog-like ball of fur, Impi continued to stare at it. 

Impi stared and stared and stared until she finally knew what it was she was looking at. 

“Cerberus?” Came out in a soft whispering and when it did, the ball of fur rolled back on its little black paws; yapping.

Cerberus didn’t stay the round ball of fur for long. The squeaky yapping becoming a bone-shaking, booming growl as it broke from its illusion of harmlessness. 

Bar far too small for the full might of Cerberus, the ceiling cracked and groaned when the three heads sprouted. The bar flattened beneath one of his paws, the slap of his salivating jowls dripping sounded like a rainstorm. 

Swept into the safety and tight curl of Cerberus’s tail, Impi held on tightly when the clamour of the ongoing fight ground to silence. 

Blinded by the thick fur of Cerberus’s tail, Impi only heard Gabriel’s “Oh shit.” Muffled before Impi forced her hands over her ears to blot out the sickening crunching of bone and flesh when Cerberus set upon Gabriel. 

All three heads taking a bite, Impi tried to ignore the sounds and pretend it was something else. 

The sense that she was forgetting something swept away the longer she tried to pretend she was somewhere else and was not listening to an Angel scream and plead for mercy. 

For God to intervene. 

No intervention came. No-one stopped Cerberus’s vicious biting and tearing. 

And Impi didn’t want it to. Not when for a second time, those who were supposed to be righteous and good, were the cruellest beings she met. 

No longer at a loss of why she felt like she forgot, of why she couldn’t grasp why she felt like she didn’t want to be there, Impi couldn’t think for even a second why she thought she wanted to come back to her simple, unfulfilled existence before the man who came to her aid even after how she quickly she tried to give him up.

Abbot was the Morning Star. Lucifer. Satan. The Devil himself. 

But he was the first and only man who truly cared for and loved Impi. Who never hurt her. Abandoned her when she needed him most. Never left her feeling like she was worthless. 

Abbot was everything Impi ever wanted. 


	14. Blood in the Water

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> https://open.spotify.com/track/69ZrXz17a2ajFEPvOpYCn6?si=DN8nEiq-QOW26D6ItGh8BQ

* * *

Rinsing out the cloth, Impi watched how the water ran black. Like water and oil, Abbot’s blood did not dilute but lay on the surface. 

Turning from the water to Abbot’s bareback, Impi winced at the miserable limping movement of the left wing. 

Sitting and watching the cities skylights out the glass panelled wall, Abbot stayed in his quiet. Hands gripping his knees to hide their trembling, he didn’t speak when Impi washed away the steady bloody flowing that dribbled from the tear in his skin. 

Wing tore and hanging by the skin and a bone; it looked wilted as it lay with tender cautious care on his back. 

Abbot took Gabriel’s heart; Gabriel was almost successful in taking Abbot’s wing. 

Pausing when Abbot hissed at the hot cloth's contact, Impi watched the black markings that spread like ancient textures over the skin ripple. 

It was the passage of Abbot’s life before his mighty fall scored into his back. Written in Hebrew, there were scars within the letters from the titan like battle with his brother, Michael. 

Abbot said even now that he never knew why his brother let Abbot keep his wings. That they were the only passage Abbot held back into Heaven. 

Impi asked Abbot only once why he kept them and never received an answer. 

Now, playing witness to the immense pain and suffering it caused Abbot to have one wing barely hanging on, Impi thought she better understood why he kept them. 

Abbot’s pain was not physical but emotional. A strong sense of attachment to the striking black wings that he was created with. 

After Cerberus ate Gabriel and returning to being the more comfortably looked upon Hell pup, Impi bared witness to Abbot’s furious expulsion over the ripping of his wing. 

Bar no longer stood but almost blown into orbit after Impi took Cerberus and fled to avoid becoming collateral damage. It was truly a harrowing sight to see Abbot bellow out his fury. 

When they came face to face, Abbot showing no care about his wings being on display for the mortal men and women who came to investigate the bar, he didn’t say a word and only took hold on Impi’s arm. 

They came back to the apartment; Abbot kept while he pretended to be a simple man. 

Since Abbot sat down and hissed through the removing of his shirt, then stared out the window. 

At first wary of approach, of even trying to offer Abbot aid, Impi sat with Cerberus sleeping in her lap. 

An hour passed by and Impi watched the rip in Abbot’s back weep and stain his skin, the wing that fluttered and ruffled like it was in deep agony. 

Bringing the water and cloth, Impi thought Abbot would tell her to leave it. Never needing assistance with any wound before. Not even when stabbed in hand with a Holy relic did Abbot need more than an hour to lay down. 

This time was different, and it seemed like Abbot was refusing to allow his body to heal. Stubbornly sitting in his silence and letting it risk fester. 

“Had you not recognised Cerberus.” Abbot breathed. “You would have forgotten everything.” He didn’t chastise or speak harshly. It was whispering. Almost like Abbot was speaking aloud a thought. 

Stopped in cleaning Abbot’s back, Impi could see his reflection in the glass how Abbot’s face scrunched into a pained smile and wince.

“Twenty four hours, and all of it, all of us, gone,” Abbot confessed, turning a look upon her from his reflection. “Your memory would be beyond even my reaches.” He explained with a heaviness. “I would have needed to start over again to bring you back.” A great sigh deflated the tension in his body, and he slumped forward, pressing the heel of his hand to his head. 

Knowing from the moment Abbot unveiled who he was to Impi that if she wanted to leave that she could not be stopped, Abbot failed to mention that her memories would leave too. 

Returned to a time before Abbot came into her life, Impi would be open to the sway of the Angels or the Fallen. To never know that she already met and fell in love with Abbot, but be told she was carrying his unborn child would have been a startling thing to discover. Likely leave her open to steer away from Abbot when he showed up if either the Angels or Fallen reached her first.

Though by the second barely escaped meeting with Gabriel, it was evident that Heaven's approach was to stop Impi even giving birth. 

Touching her stomach, it was still flat. No sign or hint or show that she was carrying Abbot’s child. It would be some time before she did. 

By Michael’s - Benjamin as he called himself - machinations, Impi forced Abbot to release her. 

Impi was sure at the time it was what she wanted. To be left alone. To not be a game played by beings who would never truly understand the human mind. How it could break, and the body left beyond repair. 

That evening proved that no matter whether Impi was with Abbot or not, there would not be peace from the dangers she faced. They would only be faced alone and with less comprehension. 

Guilt laden, angry at herself for acting like the foolish, naive woman she was, Impi resumed cleaning Abbot’s wounded wing. 

No longer baring the stars of a night sky, the silky black was dulled. Turning grey like burnt wood at the tips of every feather. 

It worried Impi that she cost Abbot something of significant importance to him. A literal part of his body and being. One of the details of his body that Impi loved profoundly. The comfort their appearance offered, how they felt beneath her fingers when she touched them. 

“It will heal.” Abbot grimaced, lifting his head, he reached to his right wing, and with a sharp inhale, plucked out a single feather. Abbot’s whole body trembled when it came free, and Cerberus whined when Abbot grit his teeth so tight, that Impi thought he would shatter them. 

Told not so long ago that it caused Abbot great pain to take out one of his feathers that he often gifted her, Impi didn’t try to act like it did not bother her when he twirled the single feather he took out over his shoulder; Gifting it to her. 

Accepting it, Impi watched how the stars fell until they could not be seen. Both from their disappearing and the cloudiness of her tears. 

“You have made a masochist of the Devil.” Abbot craned his right arm over, pulling the torn wing to his back. “What poetic justice this has turned out to be.” He almost laughed, but it was more a strange little breathing that covered his complaints as he tethered his wing upon his back again.

Sealing the tear by a brush of his finger. 

Testing the shoulder, the wing with a roll and a ruffle, they moved with much more ease. 

However, Impi was stuck and fixed on Abbot’s words that he admitted that he would suffer what he must to be loved by Impi. 

Rattled and plagued by so many doubts over Abbot’s true intentions. His thoughts and feelings for Impi, it was proven beyond a doubt that Impi’s paranoid thinking was baseless. 

Tilting the feather, watching the stars return like shooting ones, Impi wiped her eyes and drew a slight smile across her lips.

“Thank you.” She mumbled, placing down the cloth, the feather balanced with care on Cerberus’s body. “For choosing me.” She explained a little though didn’t wholly elaborate.

Touching the ashen edges of Abbot’s wing, Impi bit on her cheeks when he shivered it pleasantly; pushing it into the palm of her hand.

Readily and happily obliging Abbot and stroking his wing, Impi laid her head on his back. Able to feel the tension leaving Abbot with every soft brush of her fingers over his wing.

“I waited a millennium and longer for you,” Abbot confessed. “I don’t ever want to know a day without you again.” 


	15. Faithless

* * *

Fatigued by the evening becoming a bystander to a momentous event that no mortal could ever imagine being witness, Impi begrudgingly accepted that she needed to sleep. A gentle encouragement by Abbot furthering the point that she could barely keep her eyes open. 

Taken to bed, assured that all would be well while Impi rested, she was further reassured when Abbot plucked Cerberus from the floor where he sat snorting and huffing, to drop him on the bed. 

Curling up on the pillow beside Impi’s head, Cerberus’s soft body and troubled like breathing turned out to be the most unexpected lullaby. The surety of his presence letting Impi fall into an easy slumber. 

No milky iridescent skies entered Impi’s dreaming. No entities slipping in unawares, Impi felt like she slept the deepest and most restful in a long time by the hour she finally stirred, turning over in the thick blankets, hugging Cerberus closer from where he moved in her sleep from the pillow to be cuddled in her arms. 

Thinking at first the vibrations were Cerberus’s own, it took the Hell pup yapping and rolling out of Impi’s arms with the strength of the vibration on his small body for her to wake up. 

Cerberus’s vibrations were not his own, and they carried him in what might have been a comical way off the edge of the bed; the longer they continued. He hit the floor with a soft thumping but blessedly no yelp. 

Kicking back the covers, Impi was careful not to step on Cerberus as he buzzed with no coordination across the laminate floor. 

Overcome by a wariness, Impi was slow to take ahold on the grey body of fur, trying to hold Cerberus still. 

Holding Cerberus by his wrongly proportioned body, Impi could feel something hard in his stomach; it was the thing creating the strong vibration in his body. 

Knowing taking Cerberus to a vet was out of the question, Impi left the bedroom searching for Abbot. 

Apartment large and a modern, decadently dressed space of wealth that left it feeling cold and not homely, Impi passed through the living and dining rooms, only to stumble into the Spartan and almost clinical kitchen where Abbot was standing and acting more mortal than Devil whilst drinking from a steaming mug. 

Abbot crooked a single eyebrow when Impi placed Cerberus on the counter between them, and he watched the grey Hell pup buzz over it. 

Thinking - hoping - that Abbot would know the cause, Impi’s stomach dropped when he showed he held no clue or inclination to what was going on. Placing down the mug to approach the centre island, Abbot needed only one hand to scoop Cerberus up, squeezing him. 

Cerberus wheezed, before throwing up a ball of bloodied white feathers dripping in a sickly grey slime, only to hiccup soon after, and spit out a mobile phone. 

When its corner hit the counter, the screen cracked, blacking it out, but not before Impi saw the name flashing across it. 

Ludwig. 

The cause of Cerberus’s vibrating was Impi’s mobile phone, and Ludwig calling it. 

“Tha—!” Abbot started to pick up the phone, Impi slapped it out his hand, needing to almost climb on the counter to reach. Taking it away in a snatch only to throw it out the window above the sink. Impi needed to throw it only to reach the window. 

Only able to guess Cerberus ate Impi’s phone at some stage in the fight at the bar, Impi’s small sigh of relief to be rid of the phone died when she turned back to Abbot. 

In the palm of his hand, absent the cracking of its screen, was Impi’s phone. 

Turning briefly to the window, only to snap back and stare at the phone in Abbot’s clutches, Impi didn’t like how he stared at the name on the screen. Or how Abbot passed Cerberus over, keeping Impi from reaching and retaking the phone. 

Hands filled, grimacing and pulling away when Cerberus tried to lick her face, a smaller bloody white feather attached to the fur around his mouth, Impi’s heart almost stopped dead when the ringing stopped, and Abbot placed the phone to his ear. 

“Can I help you?” Abbot articulated coldly, a blunt but narrower eye forming when he twisted to face Impi, crossing his arm to rest in the groove of the one holding the phone to his ear. “Do you have any idea who you are speaking with?” Cutting across what seemed a cussing tangent from Ludwig. 

Willing, and forever wishing, that Impi’s past and present never crossed paths, it was agony to have the two meet in the worst possible way. 

“My my, Samuel, has it been so long that you do not know your own brother?” Abbot smiled. “Has it been so long since you fell that you forget we have been mistaken as one and the same?” He continued, embittered by his own words and the detail that he shared comparison and myth with the man he was speaking. 

All Impi heard was that Ludwig was one like Abbot. Not the same, but apparently a brother, an Angel at one time. 

Ludwig was befitting an Angel if they were similar to the ones Impi met. Though by Abbot’s own words, it suggested that Ludwig was one of the Fallen. 

Impi was in bed with a member of the Fallen long before meeting Abbot? 

Finally, Impi understood what Michael asked of her when she claimed that evil knew itself. 

Evil came in many shapes, and forms and disguises that it couldn't be known or even know itself truly. 

Being a Fallen, Ludwig being neither completely from God's grace nor accepted by Satan, entities and beings somewhere between, was truly a despicable man. 

Abbot was picking at nothing, moving his fingers across the counter's edge, appearing as though both disinterested in the talk but also thinking about it. 

“How is our brother, Samyaza?” Starting to pace, Abbot turned away after Ludwig spoke something that caused his face to contort unpleasantly. “Yes.” He glanced back at Impi from over a shoulder. “So I have been told.” He bore a sharp-eyed stare, brow creasing deeper. 

The first and only time Impi heard mention of Samyaza was when Lilith told Abbot that Impi was in bed with him whilst in Purgatory. 

The man who later turned out to be Michael was angered and rather vehemently denied that he was Samyaza. 

Now that Impi thought more about it, the man Impi met looked entirely different from the man who introduced himself as Michael once she saw his back. 

The more Impi truly thought, she realised why she felt more at ease by the strange entity than she should have been. 

Detail for detail, the man Impi first saw in Purgatory was Ludwig. That was where the similarities ended. The quiet malignant that somehow was also benign not that of Ludwig but a man who shared his face. 

The Angels were all brothers of some description, but the likeness of the one she met in Purgatory to Ludwig was that of a carbon copy. 

Which left Impi in utter confusion over who truly was the man she slept with. 

Michael or Samyaza? 

Michael denied it being Samyaza, but Impi learned rapidly; it was not wise to trust everything that came out Angel’s mouth. 

Regardless of which it was, Impi didn’t like how Abbot was staring. 

It wasn’t directly focused on Impi. Not her face. But her stomach. 

There was no effort to end the call. Abbot crushed the phone in his hand, tossing the twisted and warped metal and glass and plastic into the sink. 

Holding on tighter to Cerberus when Abbot almost shot across the room to be standing over Impi, she swallowed over and over when he asked a single question. 

“I-I-I don’t know.” Stuttered out. Truly. Impi didn’t know whom she actually slept with within Purgatory. 

Abbot didn’t even seem to be breathing. Finger and thumb pinched together he used it to better illiterate his words, articulating strongly that Impi needed to tell him exactly who it was. The lacking anger over the act of infidelity over the matter of who it occurred, unsettling. 

Dropping Abbot’s stare, Impi found Cerberus’s little inky black ones, her chest swelling, becoming consumed by the regret over the need Abbot held to ask. 

So it was by surprise that Impi, by the urging of her gut instinct blurted the name of the man who she slept with. 

“Samyaza.” Spoken in a shaken confidence, Impi refused to take her eyes from Cerberus’s when Abbot turned the finger and thumb pinching to a fist, clenching it viciously tight. 

“Are you certain?” Abbot forced the question from his grit teeth. “It is of utmost importance that you’re telling me the truth.”

There was a little more than anger for the deception. Something else that held Abbot’s concern far more than Impi sleeping with another. 

“Yes.” Impi bleated, wanting the talk to be over. Done and forgot.

Abbot let go of his fist and with it his pent breath in a great rushing response and, oddly, relief?

Slowly Abbot cradled Impi’s face in his hand, bringing it up to meet with his relieved gazing.

“While I am not exactly pleased, I am not about to hold it against you.” Abbot stroked her cheek with his thumb, a small pinch in his brow. “For should it have been Michael you embraced, you would no longer be safely with our child.” He expressed the importance and also the error of Impi’s actions.

Puzzled over how sleeping with Michael could have caused the loss of the baby, Impi wasn’t left in wonder long.

Abbot showed great displeasure to say it, but he said it nonetheless. 

“The only thing that can kill darkness is light.” Abbot took back his hand. “You can bring both.” He held out both hands like he was weighing something. “Though I have fallen beyond repent, I am still of God’s design. As are you.” He lifted one hand higher. “Neither good nor bad, but a passage for both.” He balanced his hands again. 

“While you carry my herald, you could also have brought the second coming of Christ.” He closed both hands, lowering them. 

“Which is why your meeting Michael is of greater concern to me than anything else.” There was a wariness, a pensive state of mind within Abbot. “He is the only one who can kill my child without harming the woman who carries it.” His eyes narrowed. 

“By replacing mine with his.” There was a quiver in Abbot’s speech. “Something that he can achieve as a loophole to the rules that surround your part in the war that is come.” Abbot released his wings, ruffling and bristling at his back in a display of his agitation.

Impi, however, paid them so little attention when Abbot delivered something she never wanted to know.

“I knew the night you were born. That finally the woman intended for me was gracing the earth.” Abbot partly covered his face, either in bashfulness or shame. “You were not the first, but none before drew my attention as you did.” He curled his fingers tightly around his mouth and chin, hiding the express that lay beneath. “I am telling you this now only due to knowing my brother will make it seem far more extravagantly evil than it was.” 

Abbot’s wings curled in tightly to his back, almost trying to make himself appear less like the very being he was. Evil personified. 

“Every misfortune that has befallen you has been by my design,” Abbot confessed. “I needed you kept in darkness to remain hidden from the light. To be kept from their reaches before I could approach you.” He let the hand come away from his face. “I needed you faithless.” 


	16. Divine Intervention

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> 1st * - https://open.spotify.com/track/1VF5rD2eSHHk8KhmQvPrNk?si=_fbfe-_kQkK8DRGQ7ZRlzQ
> 
> 2nd * -  
> https://open.spotify.com/track/5YC0tUmxklulsxM2etD5HK?si=vaRiJLQpRB68k-FZe-acdg

* * *

*Never a child of faith. Of God. No matter his depiction. Impi only ever questioned his existence. His actions. The total abandonment of his greatest designs. 

To be told that the pestilence of misfortune that followed Impi from the very moment of her birth was by the will of Abbot was a terrible truth to be learned. 

Forever with a sense of being unwanted. Unloved. A burden and bane of any person who came into her life and swiftly walked out, Impi came to believe that it was her fault. 

That she was not good enough. Not kind enough. Not smart or artistic. Lacking in beauty or grace. Born with a heart that could not be loved no matter how hard and long it craved to be; even if cruelly. 

A worthless presence on the earth that no one would remember, so could never be forgotten. 

Impi hated herself for so many years. The sight of her reflection. Her smile and how it was always laced and weaved by pain. How she would give her all and more for a slither of attention; even if only for a night. 

All Impi ever truly wanted was to know that she belonged. That she was wanted. Loved. 

She found it. Finally. In a man who was not a man, but kind and gentle and tender than any man ever was to her. 

It was by his hand, his touch, every little word that departed his mouth that Impi finally started to like all that she once hated about herself. To learn how to accept who she was, was never the problem - it was those she met that was at fault. 

To have all of that wrenched from her hands by the very man who placed it within them was placing salt in old wounds - they were ripped open; again. 

Left to weep and fester and rot away the slither of self-love, worth and esteem that Impi tended and nurtured carefully. 

Pushing upon Abbot something he was yet to experience, Impi grew silent in the seconds after his confession. Let it turn to minutes and then hours. Holding her tongue even though it never learned how to lash. 

Denying Abbot her voice, it became her eyes too when she refused to look upon him. Choosing instead to focus on Cerberus who sat in the fold of her arms. 

Apparently never knowing what it was like to be ignored, Abbot became flustered and impatient. Bored but agitated. Angry, though trying not to be. 

He took Cerberus from Impi in the attempt to gain a reaction. All Abbot got was a bite from Cerberus to his hand. 

The longer it went on, the hotter the room grew. Abbot’s temper boiling the air and turning it humid; he left in a silent storming rage. 

It was Abbot leaving that led Impi to where she sat then. Gazing in silent wonder upon the effigy of Christ upon the cross. For the first time, sitting in the pews of the House of God and silently asking why she was chosen to bear the weight of mankind and more. 

Impi was not special or unique in anything beyond the child; she was carefully tending in her body. Even that was not entirely uniquely her own. There were others before her. And should she not have been picked, others would come after. 

*”Troubling. Isn’t it?” Michael - or Benjamin as he preferred - spoke up from the pew behind. His arrival as silent as his presence. But not a surprise or unexpected. “To not know all the faces evil bares.” 

Impi didn’t take her eyes from the depiction of Christ. How the candles shivered and shimmered. Casting him in shadow and light all at once. 

“Truth always hurts.” Benjamin leaned forward from his pew, the brush of his arms crossing on the bench of Impi’s cold across her back. “Always seems to cause more bad than it ever does good. Creates more hurt than the sweetness of lies.” 

Impi couldn’t disagree, but she wouldn’t tell Benjamin. She refused to speak a word, even to him. 

“The folly of man is ageless.” A single, dove white feather flicked over Impi’s shoulder. Twirling and dancing on a current of cold air that traversed the pews. “How quickly they deny God’s existence with their science and magic. Trick themselves so fantastic to believe him a creation of man, yet,-“ he paused. “, Never truly stopped believing in the Devil. Of evil.” A quiet and cold chuckle tickled Impi’s ear, the burst of air swaying the tendrils of hair that fell about her face. 

“There is no darkness without light. No good without evil.” Benjamin pressed on, seemingly unbothered - or not noticing - that Impi was not speaking. “No life without death, and so forth.” He stretched forward a hand, waving it in a circle to articulate the cycles of which he was speaking. “Everything is about balance. One countering the other. Keeping the scales even and fair. Then,-“ he snatched the feather he set dancing. “, Something. Rather someone comes along and tilts it all on its head.” Opening his palm, showing the feather as it became consumed by flame and smoke, Impi watched it burn. “And it’s all over. Gone. Irreversible damage caused by the selfish desire of one person.” 

The pew behind creaked when Benjamin stood. Laying both hands on Impi’s shoulders, he squeezed them. “That man you’re staring upon suffered and sacrificed his life so that you could be here.” He came low, pressing his mouth upon the shell of Impi’s ear. “Is your love for a man who has caused you nothing but pain and misfortune and misery worth the millions who bring light and life and joy without expecting anything in return?” 

Benjamin didn’t wait for an answer. Choosing instead to leave Impi with his question and a soft kiss on top her head, and much like how he arrived, he was gone; without notice; without warning. 

Free of the weight of Benjamin’s hands on her shoulders, Impi took a breath and one last look upon the cross. 

Standing and stepping out into the walkway, Impi gave a little longer for thought. 

The weight of this burden was truly her own choice now. Whether she would allow it to weigh her down or accept it as her self appointed goal. The outcome was to be of her own making—no one else’s. 

This one time, Impi was allowed a future of her own making. 

Turning away from the effigy, she spent hours staring upon without answer to her prayers but only cruel coercion efforts, Impi walked out with more surety in herself than she ever held before. 

Abbot. The Morning Star was Impi’s choice. Heart and mind in perfect harmonies. 

Stepping out the old oak doors, Impi stopped when a single black feather, dusted in stars floated from above. 

Letting it settle and rest in her palm, Impi smiled. Picking it up and tilting it, watching how the stars became shooting stars, she let her lips part. Ending her silence to say. 

“I want to go home.” 

The gentle disruption of the air beneath Abbot's wings' spread and fold, Impi met his eyes as he placed a foot on the bottom step, offering his hand. Bending into a kneeling, the cold and astute focus, invoking Impi’s chest into a fluttering. 

“As you wish,” Abbot breathed, taking Impi’s hand more firmly when she placed it in his, drawing her into him. “My Queen.” 


	17. On Black Shores

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> https://open.spotify.com/track/6twKUPGiseTDcvJ22XuoqY?si=cISJPqdiQYyL3HfD8h6Qcg

* * *

Soft underfoot, Impi wiggled her toes in the silks and satin sands on the shores of Hell. Returning to the endless night that never broke, Impi imagined she would miss the sun again someday. 

Coming back only to be informed that she was overdue an examination and inspection of her pregnancy's progress, Impi took to the news in a grimace as always. 

Again with the midwife who was surreal beauty in light. Only to turn nightmare-inducing in the shadows, Impi quietly endured the needle-like touches of the Demonic midwife. Poked and prodded and stabbed for longer than any appointment before, Impi grew worrisome. 

Usually absent for the examinations, Abbot attended this one. Staying close but quiet while Impi grew increasingly agitated by the midwife who sucked in-breaths and created many tuts and clicks of her tongue. 

Then it stopped, and the midwife withdrew, clacking her needle fingers and mouth splitting into a too-wide smile, she announced: “She has successfully left the gestation period.” 

Stunned, Impi held her stomach and gave Abbot a questioning eye. 

All Abbot made in response was a warming smile. Relief and joy folded into a brilliant glow in his cold focus. 

Knowing that Impi would carry for a year, Impi was not precisely and entirely informed of how it worked. Three months spent wondering when she would know beyond her fickle emotions; Impi was not ready for the overwhelming and overpowering sense of life within her. 

Only starting to grow and take form, it held a presence within Impi. Almost an electric and magnetic pull to Impi’s core, her body started to respond as a pregnant woman should. 

Breasts tender and swollen. Sickness. Fatigue rolling in like the waves of oily black water breaking on the shore. Impi was standing; it was the start of showing of her stomach that created a heart swelling in Impi’s chest. 

Post gestation, Impi was officially - by Demonic standards - in her first month of pregnancy. 

The definition and application varied by Impi’s loosely grasped understanding that her body underwent unknown changes in preparation to carry The Morning Star’s child to term for the past three months. 

Now it was ready; Impi would see the expected signs of being pregnant. 

Able to lightly cup beneath her stomach, only a few fingers width, Impi couldn’t disguise or pretend that she was overcome by happiness to see it finally. 

In an almost high, Impi was fine with Abbot needing to leave to attend to his generals. 

Offered to join Abbot, it was passed over. 

Far from tactically or strategically minded, Impi would only stand in constant wonder over what was being spoken about and become lost and confused in the process. 

Unable to keep from touching her stomach, Impi became more sure of the choice she made. To not hold it against Abbot that he acted both cruel and selfish with Impi’s life to bring them to this place in time. 

She was happy. Truly happy for the first time in so long. Excited at the prospect of motherhood. All the heartache was worth it. 

Filled with renewed confidence, Impi for the first time since living in Hell traversed it without hiccup or concern. Able to take herself, for the first time, to the black shores that she only ever viewed from her room in the castle, she was swept away by its beauty. 

Never touching sands as soft or seeing waters so dark but alluring, Impi contemplated on how life would be once the war came to its climax. 

Thoughts that were chased away by Cerberus’s yapping and bouncing left and right around the black and jade crab he spotted. 

Never seeing a crab look so decorative or eye-catching, Impi winced when the crab pinched Cerberus, chasing him away before making its scuttling escape. 

Watching after the crab and how Cerberus found some unknown energy - likely insulted and wanting to make even - to bound across the sands after it as a small grey ball of fur, Impi rolled her eyes when he made it only so far; and gave up. 

Flopping on his side, Cerberus snorted and huffed. His too-small paws wiggling like he was determined to get back up and give chase again. Impi moved to pick him up, snuggling him close, amused how mighty a beast he could turn in comparison to the hapless ball he was. 

Stroking Cerberus’s head while walking the shoreline. Pleasantly surprised by how soft the water lapped her bare feet, Impi came to the decision that a life lived in Hell would not be so terrible a thing. 


	18. Surprise

* * *

Settling more sure into life in Hell, Impi found herself boldly exploring the castle. Less frightening with Cerberus’s company and sure that she would not be chased by critters with too many legs or dogs made of smoke and shadows, Impi pushed a little further and deeper every day. 

Uncovering expansive rooms empty while stumbling into tiny cupboards crammed to spilling out, Impi deemed the castle a space of confusion and chaotic organisation. 

It was day six of the exploration when Impi shuddered over the creaking whine of the heavy iron door she found herself in front of. Unlike the other doors, this one was dusted by a glittering surface that almost mimicked a night sky. 

Testing Cerberus’s response to every door before daring to open it, Impi was confident it was safe when he snorted and snuffled about her feet, his whole body wagging in place of his almost invisible tail. 

“You like this room?” Impi had asked Cerberus as he tried to paw the door with his little stubby feet. Almost toppling over from becoming unbalanced. 

Heavier and on a far grander scale than any other door, Impi had to put some effort into opening it, and she was blown away when she saw what lay behind. 

There was no end and no beginning to see through the swirl of stars that created the ceiling. Setting the large and deep water beneath aglow, four pillars of marble and glass vines emerged from the edges of the walls of the pool; stretching into the heavens above. 

Lit only by starlight and the waters' surface reflections, Impi only noticed the water was rippled by steam when Cerberus became lost within it. 

Fearing that Cerberus in his disproportioned body would not be able to swim, Impi rushed to the pool's edge, only to never find it and be wading into the water. 

It wasn’t deep. Only coming to Impi’s waist. Enough to comfortably sit and bask in the warmth of the silk-like water. 

Discovering Cerberus floating upside down and blowing bubbles, Impi had rushed to rescue him, only to be fought to get back in the water. 

Bemused and definitely bewildered at first, Impi was not left in mystery for long why Cerberus wanted to be in the water. He made it clear what he wanted. 

Which was how Impi came to be back within the room again, scratching shampoo into yet another section of Cerberus’s monolithic body. 

Room large enough to not restrict Cerberus at all, all three of his heads laid down on the crossing of his beastly front legs, contently purring as Impi sat on his back, washing the dirt and grime from his fur. Giving it a good scratch that set his back left leg thumping and spraying the water over them. 

So lost in the self-appointed task - and badgering of Cerberus - Impi missed the doors groaning open until all three heads left their comfortable dosing and growled at the person who entered. 

Unable to see. Blocked by the middle head that pricked up its ears, Impi first became wary of who it was. Then lost it when the echoing sighed: “What in the love of my name are you doing?” 

Put at ease to hear that it was Abbot, a small sigh of her own departed, and she let her hands come away from cupping her stomach. Resuming washing Cerberus’s fur. 

“He wanted a bath.” Impi answered, briefly thinking she had done something wrong. “Am I not supposed to?” She took her hands out of the suds, shaking away the bubbles and foam. 

Abbot appeared at Cerberus’s side, the water barely touching his thighs and highlighting how much shorter Impi was than him. 

“Well...” Abbot tapped two fingers on his temple, giving Cerberus’s body a head to toe inspection. “When you disappear for an entire day without warning, then no.” He gave his answer in quite a stressed manner, though it felt directed at Cerberus. “I would rather you didn’t.” He confessed, wading a step closer, before stopping. 

Cerberus’s tail spent the entire time wagging back and forth. Creating a tiny breeze that kept Impi from becoming fatigued by the constant humidity of the room. Then it stopped when Abbot came closer, coming down in a rapid arc that crashed into the water; forcing Abbot to take flight and a backwards leap to avoid it partly. 

Forced to turn away at the almost wave-like force of water that kicked up from Cerberus’s tail, Impi was thankful that she wasn’t knocked from his back when it crashed over her. 

Head came up as quickly as possible; Impi searched the vast expanse for Abbot when she couldn’t find him. Twisting about, until the soft gust of Abbot’s wings breezed over her back. 

“Do that again, and you’re going back to guarding the gates.” Abbot breathed his warning at Cerberus, coming to land in a gentle step on the large hell hounds back. 

Cerberus’s heads snapped their jowls. Growling and sniffing, mostly sulking as they settled back down. Their tail flicking moodily in the water. 

Guessing that Cerberus and Abbot were not entirely dutiful master and servant, but more prone to small arguments sometime ago, Impi tried not to be obvious in her smiling when Abbot came into a crouch at her side. The ruffle and flutter of his wings curling back showing he was displeased by Cerberus’s attempt to squash him with his tail. 

Tilting into Abbot’s hand when it brushed over her dampened hair, Impi met his eyes curiously. 

“I have some hours free.” Abbot shifted, bringing Impi to him with an ever so careful hand. “I was hoping to spend them with you.” He looked over Cerberus as he spoke. “Alone.” Came out like he was making a hint, telling Cerberus to leave. 

Happy to hear that Abbot was free from his schedule, Impi expected Cerberus to ignore the request. Only to be met by surprise and a most unwelcome drop of her stomach when he returned to his ball of fur like appearance and she was only kept from falling by Abbot’s arm coming beneath her legs. 

Far above the water, Impi clung to Abbot’s shoulders as he showed no disturbance or issue with being suspended midair. Wings at full spread and legs pointed downward and prepared to stand from the slow descent he took them to the water with; Abbot kept a sure hold on Impi. 

Never allowing Abbot to pick her up in flight, wanting her feet on safe and sure ground, Impi almost sprung out his arms to feel it again. Only to end up sitting in the water when her legs proved too shaky to stand. Glaring at the little bobbling ball of fur that pranced through the steamrolling over the surface of the water, Impi forgot her sudden annoyance when Abbot came to sit down with her. 

Peering over at Abbot with a startle on the discovery, he was absent his clothing; Impi also found herself undressed. 

Long past the nervousness of allowing Abbot to see her naked, there was only small grief that he used his endless, otherworldly power, for something so sordid. 

Body changing with the more physical aspects of her pregnancy, Impi could tell where Abbot was focused, and crossed her arms over her chest. 

Her reaction roused a smile and a brush of one of his wings. 

Thinking that his feathers could not become wet proved wrong when Impi watched the soft swaying of the ones in the water. A curiosity taking hold, Impi relaxed her arms to touch them, and almost instantly, they shivered under her fingers. 

Knowing well that Abbot enjoyed Impi stroking his wingspan, a tiny smile was hidden behind the bite of her lip when he produced cloth and soap, handing them to her. 

Thinking better than to ask outright if Abbot was jealous of the attention she showed Cerberus, she dipped the cloth and soap in the water, shuffling on her knees into the space between Abbot’s wing and his body. 

Exuding great care and attentiveness, Impi started at the very top of the wing; Abbot nestled her stomach with the palm of his hand. Stroking his thumb over the small swelling. It was soothing. 

“...I can tell you if you wish?” Abbot lightly pressed on Impi’s stomach. “Whether it will be a boy or a girl.” 

Dropping focus from Abbot’s wing to stare down at her stomach in the embrace of his hand, Impi thought about his offer for only a second. 

“No.” Impi lowered from the kneel to rest on her legs. “I want it to be a surprise.” She admitted, bringing a hand over his, sure of her answer. 

The preconceived notion that the devil's child would be a boy left Impi wanting to wait for the birth to know if it was not a coincidence but proved true. 

Abbot settled his other arm around Impi, laying a hand on her hip, drawing her in with a little grin. “A surprise?” He queried. “Here I thought you wouldn’t want any more of those.” A quiet laugh followed his thoughts. “Then if that is what you want, I shall keep it a secret even from myself.” 

Thinking at first that Abbot already knew, a quiet delight came at the concept that he would let it remain unknown even to himself. 

“Do you want to know?” Impi didn’t want to deprive Abbot of knowing if they would have a son or daughter for her sake. 

Abbot hummed contently and shook his head. “I have never truly experienced surprises. Much loses its capacity to do so when you have existed as long as I have, so I am intrigued by this sense of not knowing. Being made to wait and see is something I have yet to do.” 

Giving Abbot’s answer gentle thought, Impi leaned over to graze a kiss on his cheek. Never usually the one to initiate intimacy with Abbot, the soft surprise in his eyes was brilliant though simple. 

“I guess I was wrong.” Abbot breathed, letting his eyes close with a sigh. 

Impi blinked. “About?” 

Silence met Impi’s question for a while until Abbot smiled.

“You are a constant surprise,” Abbot answered, leaning in to give a kiss. “That I will never grow weary of.” Spoken in a whisper, he wrapped Impi up within his arms. 


	19. Fools & Rabbits

Impi might have been forgiven as a fool for believing that her troubles were over. If not for the fact she was living in literal Hell.

Exploring the desolate gardens. Studying the space barren of colour and yet so full of varying shades of black and grey, Impi was shocked at the discovery of the purest white rabbit she ever saw.

It was tiny. No bigger than Cerberus - only more spritely - as it hopped around, nibbling on dried thorns and ashy grass blades.

Curious but exuding caution over the most innocent looking creature that hopped and nibbled its way deeper into the maze of knotted thorns, Impi knew she should have ignored her curiosity. Turned around and left the rabbit alone. Been smart enough to know that nothing was as it seemed in Hell.

Tricked twice by believing an animal was the animal it looked to be - and not a human in hiding - Impi cupped the underside of her swelling stomach. An odd vibration spreading from the baby up into Impi’s chest like an alarm. A warning bell or siren trying to ward Impi away from the rabbit.

Still, Impi followed the slow hops even when she became aware that it was checking that she was following. Not moving too fast so Impi didn’t lose the rabbit inside the endless maze.

Though it should be impossible it grew darker the deeper Impi became in the maze and direction lost structure. A turn to the left became the right and a turn to the right became straight forward.

Impi was becoming lost and yet she was so entrapped by following the white rabbit she barely noticed.

Not until the maze broke down in a sudden burst of white hot flames. Screaming, cupping the sound behind a hand, Impi was trapped in the middle with no escape.

Burning a blinding and brilliant white the flames consumed the twisted thorns greedily. Reducing them to ashes but never spreading further than the dried vines.

Left standing between banks of ashes, Impi lowered the hand when a sudden wind whipped across the graveyard made of the maze; blasting the ashy dunes away.

Forced to scrunch her eyes closed and shelter in her arms, Impi became confused by the silky touch of the ashes over her skin. By the sweet twittering of bird song that started behind the howl of the winds. How natural light bled through her closed eyes. Warming her exposed skin like sun light.

Aware that the sun did not exist in Hell, Impi snapped her arms to her sides and gawked at the dreamlike landscape before her.

There was colour everywhere. Fauna and flora and air perfumed earthy and sweet, Impi was standing in the most exotic garden she ever laid eyes on.

Grasses of greens never seen, Impi was not alone in the almost heavenly place. Animals of past and present roamed carefree among the flowers and trees that reached into the cleanest blue sky. Not a single cloud in sight it allowed Impi to watch the flight of birds with the most majestic plumage. Their blues and reds and yellows bold and magnificently catching and rippling in the sunlight.

Beasts on four and two legs roamed and hopped and frolicked without fear that they were among predators.

Upon a hilltop a pride of lions lapped up the sun. Paying no mind to the Gazelle that grazed about them.

Among them, was the white rabbit. Standing out even more among the spectrum of colours as it had among the dullness of blacks and greys. Standing on its hind legs, ears pricked up and whiskers twitching. Watching and waiting for Impi to follow again.

Impi did. Walking among the lazing lions without fearing becoming a meal, Impi felt in safe passage even whilst the Cubs curled and winded around her ankles.

A magnetic resonance with the rabbit drawing Impi deeper. A thrilling hum in her heart carrying her over the hill. A desire to see the rest of the wondrous things hidden in the garden she was walking in.

Cicadas were singing with the birds. The air sweeter and warmer than any place Impi knew. The water flowing in a river so clear that Impi almost didn’t realise there was water.

With so much to look at. To hear. Smell. Impi lost track of the Rabbit for a second until a tinkle of bells drew Impi’s gaze to a single, lonesome tree.

Surrounded by water. Almost separated by an island from the magnificent garden, the tree was unlike any other Impi saw.

Pure white from its trunk to its leaves, it shimmered and glittered in the sun.

And beneath it, resting in the shade of its branches, laid the rabbit. Sleeping.

Impi stepped without hesitation in the water. Shocked by how soft it was on her skin. How smooth the bed of rocks were under her bare feet.

Bare feet?

Peering down her body, Impi gasped in awe at the flowing and floating gown that dressed her body.

Made of whites and silver, the garment was a halter neck of some design. With splits in the dress mid thigh making it freeing to move in.

Three thin silver chains evenly spaced from beneath her bust to her hip decorated the dress. A touch confirming the halter neck was actually a thick choker keeping the fabric and her modesty.

Still standing in the water, Impi touched every part of her body. Finding something each time. Decorative cuffs sat around her right arm, but on the left, a snake cast in silver wound from her shoulder to the wrist. The forked tongue brushing Impi’s wrist.

Drawn more to the snake than the beautifully studded cuffs on the other arm, Impi finally took notice of the markings on her palms.

A sun on the right and a moon on the left. The very middle of each, bleeding; painlessly.

Starting to frown, Impi stopped when the sweet symphonies stopped at the growling of a beast.

Head snapping up, Impi found the beast to be a wolf of purest nightmare imagery, preying upon the unawares sleeping innocence of the rabbit.

Impi wasn’t even sure what compelled her, but she found herself running. Desperate to save the rabbit from the dripping, snarling jowls of the wolf. Moving with no regard for her own safety, she was driven by her desire to preserve the sweet innocence of the rabbit. To keep its pure white fur untainted by the darkness that wanted to destroy it.

Impi forgot her own selfishness when she snatched the rabbit from the bite of the wolf. No care given to how her hand scraped the teeth of the wolf. The rabbit was all that mattered in that moment, and she knew she needed to protect it.

Securing the frightened rabbit in her arms, Impi blinked. Chest heaving and heart thundering, the garden was no more, and again Impi stood within the mazes of Hell.

"Funny." A voice taunted within the brisk cold of the wind that blew. "Your instinct was to preserve the rabbit even when you’re in bed with the wolf." It tickled her ears, turning to laughter over its observations.

Turning and trying to find the speaker, Impi only found the gnarled and knotted walls of the maze.

"Such sweet innocence ruined by the selfishness of one." It spoke again and that time it prompted Impi to look upon the rabbit again.

Once pure white it was stained red. Impi’s bleeding hands tainting the fur, it left her heart in a deep sinking.

"You will taint all that is pure with your decision." The voice continued to taunt. "Can you live with that? Bare that guilt?" It asked, losing its mockery in favour of soft imploring.

Swallowing the sudden rising of bile, Impi looked back at the innocent, kindly gaze of the rabbit as it stared up at her from where it nestled in her bosom.

"I...," Impi started to respond, but her voice became swallowed by the sudden: "Impi?" From behind.

Turning around, more so in a jump of fright, Impi clung a little more to the rabbit in her bloody hands.

Abbot took one look at Impi’s face before his eyes landed on the rabbit in her arms. The previous serenity in his face washing away.

At least, Impi thought Abbot was looking at the rabbit.

"What have you done?" Abbot asked, taking Impi’s hand and inspecting the bleeding palm.

In a slight daze, Impi looked again at the rabbit and her heart jackhammered to find it was not white, but a dusty grey stained red.

"I-uh...?" Impi tried to shake off her confusion. "The rabbit was stuck," she spoke slowly, deeply shaken by the change in the rabbits appearance. "I freed it." She told Abbot in a whisper.

Watching Abbot brush the torn skin of her palm. How it stung under his fingers, Abbot breathed in a soft hiss and tried to take it away.

Abbot kept ahold of her wrist, and with a slight bow, grazed his lips over the torn skin. It tingled warmly for a moment, and then stopped.

Fingers reflexively curling in surprise, they brushed under Abbot’s chin, and it made him look up at her.

Slowly Abbot stood straight, and with a little curious tilt of his head, asked: "Did something happen?"

Holding Abbot’s stare, Impi’s lips fluttered only to seal when the rabbit wriggled in her arms.

Looking down, Impi met the soft gaze of the rabbit and it left her reconsidering speaking at all.

Feeling like she was in the thrall of the rabbit, Impi set it down gently. Only to be left hollow in for chest by the separation. The rabbit stuck close. Sitting on Impi’s feet and nudging her leg with its little wet nose. Like it was telling her to pick it up again. To let it remain close.

Abbot studied the rabbit, and then looked about. Searching for something.

"Where’s Cerberus?" He inquired, a sudden sharpness in his eyes.

Fighting with the urge to pick the rabbit up again, Impi paused at the question of Cerberus.

He was with Impi before she spotted the rabbit.

"I don’t know." Impi admitted whilst losing the battle of wills and settling the rabbit back in her arms. "He was here," she looked around, listening out for his snuffling.

Becoming worried that something happened to Cerberus the threading of her heart became calmer when the rustle and annoyed snorting from behind became the fluff ball she wanted to see. 

Waddling along Cerberus stopped when his inky eyes landed on the rabbit in Impi’s arms. Hopping about in a huff and yapping, it became a gutteral growling. 

Stunned by the reaction, by Cerberus’s angry hopping about, Impi looked over at Abbot. 

“The rabbit.” Abbot tried to take it from Impi, pausing when she twisted away from his outstretched hand. “Where did you get it?” 

Impi considered her words, but she gave the truthful response: “I found him” 

Abbot withdrew his hand, only to click his fingers. The rabbit pinched by its scruff between his fingers, Impi’s arms became a scramble to take her back. “Don’t hurt him!” 

Well out of reach, Abbot scrutinised the rabbit that was stiff in his pinched fingers. The growling from Cerberus becoming more vicious, he padded over to sit on Impi’s feet. 

“Azazel.” Abbot spat, tossing the rabbit roughly. His wings bursting open, Impi barely witnessed the rabbit morph to a human shape before she was blinded by the night sky of Abbot’s wings. 

The rabbit was another shapeshifter. An Angel? 

Shocked, Impi better understood Cerberus’s angered response. The idea that he disliked Impi carrying around another pet obviously not the cause. 

“You’re still the prickly arsehole I remember, Luce.” The man, Azazel, chuckled. 

Abbot’s wings bristled, the air becoming hot enough that the maze started to smoulder and crackle, they ignited when he shouted: “How did you get in here?!” 


	20. Saintly Sinners

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It’s been almost two months since I last updated this, and I am sorry for the long as Hell (heh) wait for something new. 
> 
> Thank you to all of your darling beautiful people who have patiently waited for me to get a move on and give you a fresh new chapter! I hope you will enjoy this newest update & that you will continue to enjoy this story! 
> 
> You guys truly make this worthwhile writing & I am so happy for the support all of you are! 
> 
> Now I shall stop being sappy and let you all read! 
> 
> ❤️

Ash fell like snow. The smoke from the raizing of the maze leaving a thick grey fog that choked the air from Impi’s lungs. Hacking and coughing to take a clean breath, Impi could barely make out the bristling of Abbot’s wings through the clouded air. 

Azazel did not stop in his taunting of Abbot but kept on pushing. Laughing and cajoling; provoking a reaction from Abbot. 

Abbot responded. Bit the bait that was dangled that not even Impi saw until it was too late. 

The rattling and clanking of chains started more like a distant humming at first. Growing louder the more agitated and angered Abbot became. Like the impending arrival of a storm, the chains became thunderous as the smoke and fog started to clear. It was above them. 

That was what Impi believed at first when the sound drew to a cataclysmic fit in the sky above. 

Through wincing eyes Impi looked to the sky above when the sound roared out like a ferocious beast. Blasting the air with a wave of air that stripped away the smoke and let them see what lay in wait high above. 

A whirlpool started in the sky. Stirring up the air. It was electrified. Crackling and hissing. Snatching the stars to be tossed and hurled in its tumultuous centre. 

Fixated on the aggressive oddity in the sky, Impi took far too long to realise that it was not above them, but looming over Abbot. 

Abbot was more receptive. Aware. Focused on the storm swirling around his head. 

Wings drawn back to his shoulders, they appeared shrunken. Wary. Scared of the black swirling mass above. It forced Impi to tear her eyes from it and look at Abbot. 

Were it not for the true depth of Abbot’s fear that painted his skin ashen and deathly, Impi might have laughed over the concept that the Devil knew fear. 

Abbot’s open terror prompted a zealous laugher from Azazel. Clutching his knees as his raucous laughter doubled him over before he contorted his body into the most unnatural state. 

Bent almost completely backwards his arms were drawn right to his sides, fingers clawed and stiff, his pealing laughter became sinister as he choked out his words. 

“Not even the Devil himself can enter the final gateway!” Azazel was jubilant and was making no secret of his celebrations. 

Abbot’s jaw clenched. Teeth grinding so tight it made Impi’s own ache to hear it. 

Though the discomfort was short lived when Azazel propelled himself up to stand. Eyes maniacally focused on Abbot as he decreed: “You should never have taken Cerberus from his guard duties, Lucifer.” 

The second Azazel used Abbot’s true name, the thunderous din of chains started again. Except it was no longer only a sound, but manifested. 

“Damascus steel.” Abbot shuddered over the words. Genuine fear gripping his voice that left it in a breathless whisper. 

From the swirling mass thick chains twisted and knotted. Then. Almost in less time it took for a blink, the thick, heavy chains speared from the whirling mass. Aiming directly for Abbot who appeared petrified. Incapacitated by his fear. 

Impi didn’t know what it would achieve but she attempted to intercept the spearheaded chains. 

Sure that she was moving against her own willingness. Instilled with a sudden surety of what she was about to do without even knowing how she could stop something beyond human comprehension, Impi could not ignore the urgent tugging that moved her. 

Azazel continued his maniacal laughing. Howling almost in his success to bring Abbot to his knees. 

All Impi could focus on was that she had to reach Abbot before the chains. To get between them. After that? 

Impi didn’t exactly know what she was supposed to do after she reached the point where she was facing chains of Damascus steel coming out the sky like arrows - but she stood before them. 

It was as though someone else was in the driving seat and Impi was the passenger of her own body as she stared back at the white hot chains tearing through the air at such speed that she knew she shouldn’t be able to see them. 

But Impi could. Impi could see their trajectory. She could see how the air ignited around them. Small sparks flying off the heavy dull grey links. 

They were so hot that her skin was burning, but she wasn’t allowed to duck or dive out of their path. 

Azazel’s laughter vexatious on Impi an anger unknown to her bubbled and boiled from her core. Though it still did not feel as if it was her own. 

The moment of impact was close and Impi wanted to close her eyes. To brace for it. Instead they remained open and fixed on the chains. 

At least they were until a sharp pain tore from each of Impi’s shoulders. Vicious and brutally tearing her skin Impi’s pained shout was drowned by her sheer shock when her vision was blocked by sheer white feathers. 

They curled around Impi for only a second before they unfurled so sharp and fast enough that the wind they created was akin to a hurricane. 

Tearing up ashen earth and uprooting barren trees, the abrupt yelp of Cerberus as he was sent in a long tumble over the crumbling, cracking earth distracted Impi enough for her not to realise that the Damascus steel chains were snapped and crumbling from the fading whirlpool above. 

Their charging assault forced into a whimpering retreat by the sheer force of the wings. 

The splitting pain in Impi’s shoulders fading, the wings ruffled and shivered. Relaxing and curling back. It took Azazel’s enraged screaming to notice that the wings were attached to Impi. 

In shock. Dismay almost at the disfigurement of her body, Impi’s fingers trembled while reaching over her shoulder. Touching the space that should have been smooth skin, only to find soft, silk like feathers. 

Shock gripping Impi a twist allowed her to look over the shoulder she touched. Not trusting her fingers and needing to look, Impi couldn’t see the point the wings joined her skin, but she saw the soft curvature of a single wing, beyond it, Abbot. 

Expecting Abbot to hold answers and explanation for the appearance of the wings, Impi was not assured at all by his open, furious scowling. The almost snarl of his lips there was a tremor that coursed through him, setting the earth beneath quivering. 

Unable to look away from the velocity of Abbot’s face, Impi soon realised it was not anger, but despair that marred his usual stoic silence. Despair and possibly humiliation. Impi was left in a despair of her own when Abbot breathed: “Even my power has its limits.” 

“Abbot?” Impi implored him with his name alone for explanation. Answers of how it was possible she could bare wings the colour of an Angel’s. 

“Though the body is tainted.” A slow cruel chuckle accompanied the voice. It was agonisingly familiar and there was no mistaking who it belonged. 

Turning, staring at the presence who lounged upon the furiously hissing Azazel’s shoulder, Impi couldn’t fathom Benji’s presence. Or why he was smiling so wicked and victorious. 

“The soul is still pure.” Benji patted Azazel’s shoulder who was in a silent fit of anger. His lips pulled almost entirely between his teeth, Azazel’s screaming of frustration was almost muted. 

Benji on the other hand paid no mind to the man’s internalised struggle and instead was jovial and plucky as he sprung forward with a theatrical spreading of his arms, like he was an actor on stage about to announce the final act. 

“Father has been merciful on her soul and granted her the greatest gift he can bestow on a mortal woman...” Benji was mad in his excitement. Eyes wide and glittering, he almost danced across the broken earth, drawing closer to Impi he gripped her shoulders before bending down to whisper for her ears only. “Sainthood.” 

Impi’s heart for a spell had been pounding. Hammering at her chest. But it stopped when Benji whispered in her ear; entirely. 

Sainthood was only possible after death. 

“Don’t fight it.” Benji whispered as Impi’s body bled icy cold. Her arms, legs, becoming limp. Her head started to feel heavy on her neck. Falling forward, Impi knew it collided with Benji’s collarbone, she just couldn’t feel it. “That’s it. Sleep now, Impi.” Benji hushed, his grip leaving her shoulders as she started to fall. 

The fall didn’t stop with the ground. Though Impi could no longer see, she knew that she was still falling. 

Falling deeper and deeper into her death. 


End file.
